Where Have All the Nurses Gone?: The Impact of the Nursing Shortage on American Healthcare

At 6:30 A.M. a head nurse reviews room assignments and the day's challenges ahead: twenty-nine patients, most of them seriously ill, and four nurses to care for them. That means a barely manageable and potentially risky patient-nurse ratio of seven to one, with one nurse taking eight patients. Unfortunately, this dismal scenario is played out again and again in hospitals across the country.This in-depth, behind-the-scene's account of a healthcare system under stress and the declining qualit...