While these statistics don’t tell the whole story, they are the litmus test for what’s happening throughout the whole system. And every week these statistics tell us that the pressures nursing staff are facing show no sign of relenting, wherever they are working.
Sometimes we lose sight of the impact on the individual in the face of such large numbers. Thousands of people waiting for hours in A&E, anxious and concerned. Patients stuck unnecessarily in hospital beds, separated from family and friends, because hard-pressed community and social care services don’t have the resources to provide the care packages needed to enable people to be discharged home or close to home.
The same applies when we look at the number of staff missing from Scotland’s NHS and social care services. The numbers are so large that it’s hard to put that into context.
What does it mean to say that we are missing 4,600 registered nurses in our NHS alone? It means that patient safety is at risk, that care is being left undone, that families find it hard to get their questions answered.
Nursing staff are facing impossible decisions on which buzzer to answer, which individual to prioritise, who won’t get a home visit this week - knowing there simply aren’t enough of them to do it all.
Nursing staff don’t have time to get the rest and recuperation they need during their shift. They can’t take their breaks because there are too many vacancies and colleagues are off sick; and because the rise in the numbers of patients needing their care in hospitals and in the community shows little sign of slowing.
Nursing staff go home to their families exhausted and stressed, carrying the burden of that relentless pressure and the care that they feel they have left undone.
Scotland’s care homes face very similar challenges. With increasing clinical need and fewer registered nurses to monitor and manage long-term conditions, when a resident deteriorates, calling an ambulance is the only option.
Urgent action is needed to ensure there are enough registered nurses and nursing support workers to delivery safe and effective care across all settings. We need effective workforce planning that is based on population need, implementation of Scotland’s safe staffing legislation and fair pay that truly reflects the essential role that nursing staff play 24 hours a day seven days a week.
These are the messages we have been repeating time after time to the First Minister, Deputy First Minister, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care and Chief Nursing Officer during discussions about health and care service pressures and during pay negotiations. We are continuing to repeat the messages in the current pay negotiations. They know beyond any doubt that enough is enough and they need to do better and deliver change.
