Staffing tool trialled at West Coast DHB.
Article Type: Brief article
Subject: Health boards (Planning)
Health care industry (Human resource management)
Nurses (Practice)
Medical care (Quality management)
Medical care (Management)
Pub Date: 04/01/2012
Publication: Name: Kai Tiaki: Nursing New Zealand Publisher: New Zealand Nurses' Organisation Audience: Trade Format: Magazine/Journal Subject: Health; Health care industry Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2012 New Zealand Nurses' Organisation ISSN: 1173-2032
Issue: Date: April, 2012 Source Volume: 18 Source Issue: 3
Topic: Event Code: 220 Strategy & planning; 280 Personnel administration; 200 Management dynamics Computer Subject: Health care industry; Company business planning; Company personnel management; Company business management
Product: Product Code: 8043100 Nurses NAICS Code: 621399 Offices of All Other Miscellaneous Health Practitioners SIC Code: 8000 HEALTH SERVICES
Geographic: Geographic Scope: New Zealand Geographic Code: 8NEWZ New Zealand
Accession Number: 288872530
Full Text: A new tool for planning nursing and midwifery staffing levels and rosters is being trialled by the West Coast District Health Board (WCDHB) in Greymouth. "The new TrendCare daily reporting tool should allow a co-ordinated response to variation across all clinical services. It is anticipated it will enable duty nurse managers to respond more systematically out-of-hours to variance in nursing workload," the DHB's director of nursing and midwifery Karyn Kelly said.

She was responding to an article in the February issue of Kai Tiaki Nursing New Zealand, [What's happening with safe staffing?, p7] which questioned the DHB's apparent lack of continued participation in the safe staffing healthy workplace (SSHW) programme. That was not correct, she said. "SSHW is integral to how we are working," Kelly said. "The new tool means we are continuing to work on getting the right number of people with the right skills matched with the resources."

The DHB was one of the inaugural SSHW pilot sites. With evolving models of care and collaboration with Canterbury DHB around service delivery on the West Coast, there was an opportunity to refocus and consolidate SSHW principles.

"While we don't have it perfect yet, we believe we are continuing to work with the principles of the SSHW model and are committed to achieving a sustainable and safe workplace," Kelly said.
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