Nursing Activities Score in the intensive care unit: analysis of the related factors.
BACKGROUND
High costs of intensive care as well as quality of care and patient safety demand measurement of nursing workload in order to determine nursing staff requirements. It is also important to be aware of the factors related to high patient care demands in order to help forecast staff requirements in intensive care units (ICUs).


OBJECTIVE
To describe nursing workload using the Nursing Activities Score (NAS); to explore the association between NAS and patients variables, i.e. gender, age, length of stay (LOS), ICU discharge, treatment in the ICU, Simplified Acute Physiology Score II (SAPS II) and Therapeutic Interventions Scoring System-28 (TISS-28).


METHODS
NAS, demographic data, SAPS II and TISS-28 were analysed among 200 patients from four different ICUs in a private hospital in São Paulo, Brazil.


RESULTS
NAS median were 66.4%. High NAS scores (> 66.4%) were associated with death (p-value 0.006) and LOS (p-value 0.015). Logistic regression analysis demonstrated that TISS-28 scores above 23 and SAPS II scores above 46.5 points, classified as high, increased 5.45 and 2.78 times, respectively, the possibility of a high workload as compared to lower values of the same indexes.


CONCLUSIONS
This study shows that the highest NAS scores were associated with increased mortality, LOS, severity of the patient illness (SAPS II), and particularly to TISS-28 in the ICU.
Padilha
Katia Grillo
KG
School of Nursing, University of São Paulo, Av. Dr. Eneas de Carvalho Aguiar 419, CEP 05403-000, São Paulo SP, Brazil. kgpadilh@usp.br
de Sousa
Regina Márcia Cardoso
RM
Queijo
Alda Ferreira
AF
Mendes
Ana Márcia
AM
Reis Miranda
Dinis
D
D018806:APACHE; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D003422:Critical Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D005260:Female; D017052:Hospital Mortality; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000458:organization & administration*; D007902:Length of Stay / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D020380:Needs Assessment / Q000458:organization & administration; D024802:Nurse's Role; D015401:Nursing Administration Research; D009741:Nursing Staff, Hospital / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013996:Time and Motion Studies; D016526:Workload / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*