Attention Healthcare CIOs: Nurse Staffing and Satisfaction a Top Priority
SEATTLE, April 25, 2008 — As the widespread dearth of nurses spreads in healthcare where labor accounts for the largest portion of operating costs, organizations are turning to Kronos for Healthcare from Kronos® Incorporated for efficient management of the workforce through effective staff scheduling.
"Healthcare organizations are increasingly making a direct connection between nurse satisfaction, patient satisfaction, and business success," said Brian Graves, global practice leader of healthcare at Kronos. "Nurse staffing is complicated and critical to the success of today's healthcare organization."
According to "Gartner's Top 12 Actions for the Healthcare CIO, 2008" 1: "Appropriate nurse staffing is essential to patient care quality; there is growing world demand for this function, and shortages are a persistent problem." The report also states the following: "The importance of recruitment, satisfaction, and productivity makes nursing the classic place to focus on technology-enabled improvement." But, according to the Gartner study: "Equally important, nurses indicated their disappointment with current technology that led to work-arounds and took time away from patients."
Healthcare organizations need to quickly respond to the needs of the nurses to tackle the labor crisis. Appropriate nurse staffing is essential to patient care quality while providing an opportunity to more effectively manage to budget with the persistent labor shortages that exist in healthcare today.
All Children's Hospital
A leader in pediatric treatment, education, and research, All Children's Hospital, a Kronos customer for more than seven years, implemented Kronos for Healthcare as part of its mission of utilizing technology to improve employee productivity and manage to budget effectively.
"Kronos for Healthcare has enabled our managers to make informed staffing decisions, and helps the organization to better manage challenges pertaining to labor costs, labor shortage, and variable workload," said Sharon M. Kimball, R.N., chief nursing officer at All Children's Hospital. "We have been able to save $1.5 million in labor costs while maintaining our standards of quality care."
Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare
"Good scheduling and staffing practices keep nurses happy and productive and facilitate meeting budget and benchmark targets," said Maureen Furno, R.N., director, staffing and scheduling at Wheaton Franciscan. "Kronos' solution helps us put such practices in place and enables us to balance labor costs with quality care."
All Children's Hospital and Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare are among a growing number of organizations around the world that are combating the nursing deficiency and other related challenges through a sound framework for effectively managing the workforce.
Kronos for Healthcare
Kronos for Healthcare is a comprehensive offering of software and services designed to manage labor costs, increase productivity, and improve employee satisfaction while supporting quality patient care with a quality workforce. The integrated suite addresses the challenges of managing the workforce in healthcare with solutions for labor productivity, supplemental labor management, staff scheduling, absence management, time and attendance, human resources, payroll, hiring and selection, and labor analytics.
Kronos made this announcement from the American Organization of Nurse Executives (AONE) 41st Annual Meeting and Exposition, being held April 25–29 in Seattle, Washington. Kronos is exhibiting in booth #721.
About Kronos Incorporated
Kronos Incorporated empowers organizations around the world to effectively manage their workforce. At Kronos, we are experts who are solely focused on delivering software and services that enable organizations to reduce costs, increase productivity, improve employee satisfaction, and ultimately enhance the level of service they provide. Kronos serves customers in more than 60 countries through its network of offices, subsidiaries, and distributors. Widely recognized as a market and thought leader in managing the workforce, Kronos has unrivaled reach with more than 30 million people using a Kronos solution every day. Learn more about Kronos at www.kronos.com.
Source 1: "Gartner's Top 12 Actions for the Healthcare CIO, 2008" by Vi Shaffer, Barry Runyon, Jonathan Edwards, Thomas J. Handler, M.D., Barry R. Hieb, M.D., Wes Rishel – published on March 26, 2008.
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