Complexity compression: nurses under fire.
It has been documented that up to 40% of the workday of nurses is taken up by meeting the ever-increasing demands of the systems of healthcare delivery in which nurses are employed. These demands include the need for increasing documentation, for learning new and seemingly ever-changing procedures, and for adapting to turnover in management and administration. Attention to these issues also means that 40% of that workday is not available to patients. Believing that these increasing demands are affecting nurses' decisions to remain in nursing or to leave, a group of Minnesota nurses and nurse educators examined the work environments of nurses and the issues related to those environments. The result of this examination was discovery of a phenomenon affecting all nurses that may be central to the projected shortage of nurses. The phenomenon is complexity compression-what nurses experience when expected to assume additional, unplanned responsibilities while simultaneously conducting their multiple responsibilities in a condensed time frame. The phenomenon was validated by a group of 58 nurses who participated in focus groups that led to the identification of factors influencing the experience of complexity compression. These factors were clustered into six major themes: personal, environmental, practice, systems and technology, administration/management, and autonomy/control. Further validation studies are planned with the population of practicing professional nurses in the state of Minnesota.
Krichbaum
Kathleen
K
Undergraduate Studies in Nursing, University of Minnesota School of Nursing, Minneapolis, MN, USA. krich001@umn.edu
Diemert
Carol
C
Jacox
Lynn
L
Jones
Ann
A
Koenig
Patty
P
Mueller
Christine
C
Disch
Joanne
J
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003659:Decision Making, Organizational; D004282:Documentation; D017144:Focus Groups; D006272:Health Facility Environment; D006801:Humans; D008910:Minnesota; D024802:Nurse's Role / Q000523:psychology; D015404:Nursing Methodology Research; D009740:Nursing Staff / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000523:psychology*; D009936:Organizational Innovation; D017009:Professional Autonomy; D011361:Professional Competence / Q000592:standards; D012579:Schools, Nursing; D020377:Self Efficacy; D012956:Societies, Nursing; D013597:Systems Analysis; D013997:Time Factors; D017749:Total Quality Management / Q000458:organization & administration; D016526:Workload / Q000523:psychology*; D017132:Workplace / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000523:psychology*