Advocating for Change

As voters turned out across the country for last week’s midterm election, a group of students in the School of Nursing showed their support on an important issue facing the medical community.

Junior nursing students Keith Hanley, Kyle Minder and Will Butler wrote and submitted a resolution at the annual National Student Nurses’ Association (NSNA) conference in April to support implementing safe nursing staff ratios. They attended the conference with faculty and 11 members of the Widener Student Nurses’ Association to learn about health care trends and issues that can impact the future of the nursing profession.

The resolution, which first passed at the state level in the Student Nurses’ Association of Pennsylvania, recommended several measures to establish a set limit on the number of patients assigned to nurses. The motion pointed to various research that demonstrated how setting ratio limits can decrease infection, mistakes and deaths among patients as well as improve the rate of staff turnover and fatigue.

“Being able to write this resolution, we were not just impacting students, but nurses that are in the field currently,” said Hanley, one of the authors. “To see them have a better chance to care for their patients and care for their loved ones, it really makes you think…we are able to help people we never thought we would be able to.”

The students presented the resolution before the NSNA student delegation, the governing body in charge of deliberating, voting on and implementing resolutions. The delegation voted to pass the resolution and it was later adopted by the NSNA and distributed to national organizations, including the Massachusetts Nurses’ Association, for their consideration on the matter.

Safe nurse-to-patient ratios has been a longstanding topic of discussion and debate in the health care community. In last week’s election, a ballot question in Massachusetts, backed by the Massachusetts Nurses’ Association, proposed legislation to address the issue. If passed, the ballot would make it mandatory for hospitals to follow specific nurse-to-patient ratios in identified departments, such as the Intensive Care Unit and Emergency Department.

Ultimately the ballot did not pass, but the significance of engaging in health care policy and legislation was not lost on the students.

“We succeed from failures,” said Hanley. “[The issue] will be brought up again and it will be talked about. Our ultimate goal is to get [a law] passed in Pennsylvania and then have other states follow.”

Hanley said the process has inspired him and his classmates to stay involved in the discussion and continue their work as a summer research project.

“We’re just three students…but I feel that that’s where the biggest change comes from. From the ones who are actively learning, listening and understanding what’s going on.”