Abstract:
In their effort to provide adequate and quality health services, health systems in both developed and the developing countries have to confront the challenges of an ever increasing population with limited or diminishing resources. This includes the human resource which constitutes a major input in health care delivery and a key determinant of the cost and quality of care. There is an increasing need therefore for health organizations to identify the most appropriate staffing levels and skill mix to ensure efficient use of the limited health personnel. This paper demonstrates the use of the workload indicator of staffing needs (WISN) methodology in determining staffing requirements for the nursing staff in a hospital setting. It shows how the results can be used to assess overstaffing and understaffing as well as determine the work pressure among the different categories of nurses thus providing a basis for effective nurse redistribution to exploit efficiency gains without compromising the quality of services.
