Severe and chronic understaffing will be the death of us.

[vanlassie]

Three stories from current events... A nurse in a busy emergency room passes critical information relating to EBOLA and it gets "missed."
The Secret Service, by the admission of it's director, is understaffed. It "misses" more than one egregious breach in the security of the POTUS and his family.
And a high school kid spends three years in prison without a trial, as another DUer explains the court is severely understaffed.
Last month my daughter labored with an un diagnosed breech baby for over 16 hours, before the "understaffed" nurses managed to notice and she was delivered by c section.
Everywhere you look, workers are trying their best to do more with less. It's gonna cost us more than it saves (saving for the one percenters, of course.)

[Stargazer99]

1. A good reason to question the values of capitalism

But of course the gas-lighted masses won't even begin to question
No wonder Texas didn't want critical thinking taught in that state!
The lack of critical thinking works just as well nationally.

[daleanime]

36. +1

[Perseus]

81. There is nothing wrong with capitalism

It is the same as when people say "Politics is so dirty"...the problem is not capitalism or politics, the problem is greedy people.

Capitalism could work very well if people's principles were stronger, if voters took the time to understand their politician's true intentions, if they kept tags on the politicians voting records and the bills they pass, if they would see past the rhetoric and the flag/religion hiding, but when most of us do not take them time to read, learn and make the crooks accountable for their actions then we breed corruption.

So stop blaming capitalism or politics, neither of those are bad, it is the greed from the people who "lead".

[SalviaBlue]

84. Laissez-faire capitalism is the problem.

Capitalism must be well regulated.

[vanlassie]

87. AbsoFUCKINGlutly.

[irisblue]

2. but but employment costs

limit corporate profits, leaving the job creators with less money.

[Orrex]

3. Good grief! I hope that your daughter and grand-baby are ok!

And why the hell didn't your daughter work harder to maintain Whitehouse security?!?

[valerief]

4. Yeah but the investors are making out like bandits and that's all that matters.

[AZ Progressive]

5. That's what happens when as much money as possible is being sucked away from society

and of course going to the 1%.

[glinda]

8. THE PROBLEM. In the last less than 3 years

I have witnessed this at Hospitals, Rehabs/Transitional, Skilled care and Assisted living facilitates. It is rampant and a given. Also communication/poor is also right on top as the other issue.

[Delmette]

39. Me, too!!

My elderly mother just went in to rehab for a broken hip. Just one screw up nearly did her in. Family has to double check everything and be there sometime every day.

[glinda]

55. Yup. It is sad to have to actually be there every day and we pay for their care!

[RedCappedBandit]

6. Yup. This is the problem with out profit-driven capitalist society.

[Kalidurga]

7. I noticed more than 10 years ago in retail

It's going to cause a lot of early death for people in retail, fast food, factories and other places where they expect one person to do the work of three.

[marym625]

9. I used to make really good money

6 figures, though at the bottom of that. I worked no less than 60 hours a week, constantly, for over 6 years. Often times between 80 and 100 hours a week. I had no personal life at all, my life was work. I aged 20 years in those 6 years, my health deteriorated, I was constantly stressed out, never slept, etc. Not worth it.

Now I make less than I have in 25 years. But I have a life. The money just is not worth it.

My job, however, did not cause anyone to stay in jail unjustly, to die when could have easily been saved. There's no excuse. Corporate America and the Corporation of America are killing us inside and outside the system.

UNION is even needed for low and mid level managers now.

[daleanime]

37. Union is needed for ALL our workers!

[marym625]

41. yeah! them too!

[vanlassie]

42. Agreed!!

[Rebl]

68. Second that!

[corkhead]

10. This will happen as long as we elect republicons bent on proving that "government doesn't work"

I think they govern poorly on purpose to prove that very point.

[YOHABLO]

70. Capitalism works only for those who have ''capital''

[Zorra]

11. Rec'd to infinity. The problem is CAPITALISM.

We need to end the rule of the 1% and institute a people's government solely dedicated to serving the needs and interests of human beings.

[libodem]

15. .

You are awesome.

[marym625]

18. ZACTLY, ZORRA!! n/t

[heaven05]

20. I wish

[hunter]

85. We need to tax the uber-wealthy, those who can buy the political process, out of existence.

Go ahead, let them flee to other nations with their paper wealth. Their stuff stays here.

I'm not talking about the moderately wealthy 1%, the people who have a couple of nice homes and cars, I'm talking about the people who make unimaginable incomes by looting the environment, economy, pensions, etc., and by manipulating the political system and financial markets in their own favor.

[uppityperson]

12. It is interesting, what we in the first world have gotten used to, how things were and now are not

Things have peaked, are now headed downward in many ways.

[vanlassie]

14. Yeah. All the stuff we used to think we were so GREAT about.

Gone. And the "Global Recession" is an excuse that can be used forever to justify tightening the screws.

[ReRe]

28. I agree...

... we have gone far past "downsizing." I actually believe this society is collapsing on itself. Everything's being run on less than a skeleton crew. And nothing about our lives, or our world, is exempt.

[libodem]

13. Yep

Of courrrrse they blame the ER nurse they must not have been able to pin it on a CNA or the janitor. Shit rolls downhill.

Doctors never read the nursing notes.

[eilen]

73. They don't read the nursing notes, nor the admission assessment.

The only thing they read are any discharge note/summary and lab results as well as any tests (xrays, ct etc.). I don't even know why I kill myself to document thoroughly. I guess I figure it can end up in court. ERs are so busy, the nurse could have been pulled away on another case before she could get in touch with the provider (usually one doctor) that staffs the ED before the patient was summarily discharged (no insurance).

[SheilaT]

16. I am a little surprised that

the fact the baby was in a breech position wasn't noticed before she went into labor in the first place. I know that the two times I was pregnant, the nurse-midwives (first time) and OB (second time) were monitoring that quite closely in the last few months.

My first baby was a bit late in turning into the right position, which had the midwives rather concerned, but he switched on his own and all went well.

[KeepItReal]

17. Maximized Profits (corporations) and Reduced Budgets (public sector)

Both resulting from today's corporate greed and GOP and 3rd Way/Neo-Liberal/New Democrat austerity programs.

[marym625]

19. From the Washington Post 9/25/14

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/09/25/the-pay-gap-between-ceos-and-workers-is-much-worse-than-you-realize/

[heaven05]

22. yep

says it all and workers get barely enough to eat, keep a roof over ones head and the lights and heat on.

[marym625]

25. Disgusting

I guess it just shows that moral fiber, or lack thereof, is very much connected to success in business.

even

[valerief]

30. OR it pays to be a non-CEO in any of these listed countries EXCEPT the US. nt

[daleanime]

40. Amen....

[golfguru]

53. Nice chart! Clearly shows white collar robbery with no jail time.

American CEO's are performing white collar robbery and getting away with it.

No CEO should be paid more than 50 times the lowest paid worker in the outfit.

It is fine to install additional incentives such as stock options for profit performance of the outfit. However every worker in that outfit should also share in that.

Because every worker contributes to the success of the outfit.

[marym625]

69. I used to work for a small manufacturing plant

There were 30 plant employees and 8 people in the office. Every plant employee, except the two supervisors, were hispanic or black. Every office worker, white. After being there 15 years, the highest paid plant employee, other than the supervisor, was given a raise to $10 p/h. At the time that was less than $3 over minimum wage. When minimum wage increased 94% of the plant employees had to be given a raise to meet the minimum.

Every office employee made at least $60k. The men all made more than the women. The sales manager made 30x more than all the plant employees combined.

This was a family owned company that has been in business for 140 years. And nothing ever changes.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

82. as you said...

and

[RobinA]

21. It's Already

been the death of many unlucky people.

Medicine is frightening. I would suggest that anyone who sets foot in a hospital take along an overseer.

[calimary]

23. I was watching CNN and hearing the voice of the Dallas mayor, I couldn't help it.

First thing I thought was "is he a republi-CON? Because if he is, we're fucked."

Whenever you have a republi-CON in power, you're GOING TO have an individual who believes less government is better. Who believes that the first thing to do is make it smaller. Cut it back. Defund it. It's icky. Too powerful. Too intrusive. Too expensive. The old idiotic canard that always and inevitably starts with - "We Don't NEEED... And that's a prescription for mass death here. When funding is cut all over the place, staffing is cut, research is cut, because a few of us don't like paying taxes (Equals SELFISH!!!!!! And SHORTSIGHTED!!!!!!!), and we opt for the old reagan game of Penny-wise/Pound-foolish, and a situation like one of these arises (AND mind you, all three of these examples you site, vanlassie, are happening at once and there's undoubtedly more we just haven't heard about yet), it's a recipe for the worst case scenario in each case OR all of them.

There were a few people I saw interviewed in the wake of Hurricane Katrina who reluctantly began to agree that - "uh, well, I guess maybe there ARE cases where we do NEED government..." And I guarantee you, as soon as they figured the crisis had past, they forgot all about that.

[KansDem]

27. The one question I have whenever I hear a republi-CON froth at the mouth about government...

...is "What will you have if you are successful in ridding us of government?" Answer: "Corporations."

I think that's the end game for them: privatize the public sector so the wealth continues to trickle up.

I mean, how ludicrous! Government is "the people." Are they saying they don't trust "government" because they don't trust their neighbors and co-workers? Their friends and family? That's what government is!

Democracy: government of, for, and by the people
Oligarchy: government of, for, and by the plutocrats

[annabanana]

34. Exactly. We ARE the Government. We hire politicians to be OUR lobbyists..

That is their JOB.

This is the point that the oligarchs have succeeded in hiding from a semi-aware public who thinks TV tells the truth...

[randome]

24. Crisis governance. Lazy Conservatives blocking everything they can.

[hr][font color="blue"][center]Treat your body like a machine. Your mind like a castle.[/center][/font][hr]

[vanlassie]

26. Maybe a dose of Ebola would change their outlook!

[randome]

31. Yeah, but then they'd try to blame THAT on Obama, too.

We have all the tools at our command to turn this country into a practical Utopia yet we still have Conservative Neanderthals to deal with. I wonder if Cro-Magnon felt the same level of frustration?
[hr][font color="blue"][center]A ton of bricks, a ton of feathers, it's still gonna hurt.[/center][/font][hr]

[ReRe]

32. In Disaster Capitalism...

... the lazy conservative's cups runneth over with profit from the grief of the masses.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

29. Then there's the push to have 12 hour shifts.

Usually 3 of them back to back. Then they have you work over your actual 12 hours. All to avoid the 40 hour work week laws of time and a half. People then get told they're lazy for having four days off so they get TWO jobs like that so they're working 72 hours a week and getting ZERO overtime pay.

So you are not only understaffed, you are overworked and dead on your feet.

But proud of being anti-union.

[Enthusiast]

62. +1

[eilen]

74. Where I work they give health benefits to part time.

It is very hard to get full time though (which gives full time ETO (earned time off -- a pool of sick/vacation time). But you are worked full-time plus. They rely on overtime as a staffing strategy. We are so burnt out it isn't funny. Every floor has a critical shortage. On weekends (and some weekdays) my bedside nurses have 8 or 9 patients-- and the BIC claim we are overstaffed on them. Really sick and (much bigger) people are in the hospital now. I work on a cardiac unit. They took away our monitor techs as well. But they gave us $$$ magic phones and special ceiling lifts (which we really don't know how to obtain a lift sheet for yet but hey, they are speshul. If someone falls I do have a panic button. Crisis medicine at its best.

[vanlassie]

89. Dreadful, for everyone.

[annabanana]

33. "Starve the Beast"

"Shrink it down to the size where you can drown it in a bathtub".

When Agencies and Departments that have been created to PROTECT us from dirty air and water; from dirty politicians and corporations that want to pollute because it's cheap, are deprived of the MEANS TO DO THEIR JOB, ..They can point and say, "See? Government can't do anyting right.. We Must Privatize and Monetize"

[deutsey]

35. That combined with austerity measures

that gut our ability to stay on top of and effectively respond to crises like climate change, Ebola (here and abroad), etc, are making the 21st century appear to be quite bleak, even for the one percenters.

[vanlassie]

38. And I just thought if another major fuck up caused by the same things.

VA Hospitals, anyone?

[CrispyQ]

43. While corporations sit on piles & piles of cash.

But hey, they're people too, ya know, so what the fuck.

[catrose]

44. a-MEN eom

[gwheezie]

45. I'm a nurse. I love my job.

But you have no idea how many mistakes are made. The healthcare system tragically failed my husband. Once it almost killed him and left him unable to live his life fully and the 2nd time the mistakes may have cost him his life. Right now I'm getting ready to drive 500 miles to get my dad out of the hospital. He went on for one thing and now everyday something else goes wrong. They are no longer treating the illness but now the result of the treatment.
I'm over worked I know it. I get stretched to the limit.

[vanlassie]

54. Please be careful, gwheezie, and take care of yourself.

[AverageJoe90]

46. It's time to put the reins on capitalism once and for all.

Just look at Canada or the nations of Scandinavia.....they don't have the same problems that we do.

[Stargazer99]

47. Shh, you will scare the hell out of the capitalist!

[erpowers]

50. Do They Have Other Problems?

Are places like Canada and Scandinavia that much better than the United States? Are their economies really better than the United States' economy?

[WinkyDink]

48. One example I really learned about this year: Nursing homes.

[femmocrat]

67. Absolutely.

Terribly overworked and understaffed.

[WinkyDink]

83. My husband, my mother, and my friend: all this year. Long times between ringing a buzzer and having

someone show up; not good if it's for an urgent bathroom need. Or, as with my husband, one is aspirating.

My 90-yr-old mother was in for a broken arm/rehab; nobody thought that maybe she couldn't open milk cartons or even packs of crackers.

Forget about someone's coming around simply to chat for 5 minutes.

Systemic deficiencies are writ large in such seemingly small things.

[erpowers]

49. High School Kid's Story

Can you give me a link to the story about the high school kid who spent three years in jail? I would like to read the story in order to get more details. Sorry about your daughter. I hope she and the baby are doing well.

[vanlassie]

56. Yes

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025610794

[Warpy]

51. They drove wages down

and then they decided they weren't making enough money, so they did a general speedup across the board. If you work for a living anywhere, you have experienced this, from janitors to doctors.

The next person who says "do more with less" to me is going to get an old lady's fist in the snot locker.

[kairos12]

52. One Percent Motto: "Austerity for Thee, Prosperity for Me."

[RadiationTherapy]

57. In our "service economy" it seems that what passes for "success" in terms of HR and management today

is to collect the most amount of money from the greatest number of clients possible via the least number of staff who are paid the lowest wages attainable. It is a sickening distortion of the potential of enterprise.

[glinda]

58. My father maybe dying as I type. I was just told in the last two hours:

"He will be leaving here to transport to bigger Hospital in 15 minutes." & two hours later by another person "He will be leaving after transfuse". & "He will not be getting transfuse". Seriously?

[vanlassie]

60. So sorry. I hope he's OK.

[eilen]

75. I work in a busy regional hospital

and I know how complications can arise. To COBRA a patient to another hospital can sometimes be very difficult. The paperwork involved, the appropriate transport, paying for the transport-- what ins. will cover etc, and the stability of the patient as well as finding a nurse to travel with the patient are big factors and then if the transport actually arrives on time (they only arrive on time if the paperwork and MD's discharge are not done) and in the meantime while you are waiting, the patient's condition can change. I hope your father receives the appropriate attention and intervention. Transfusions (especially in fluid sensitive individuals-- the entire thing can take 6 hours -- type and cross processing, delivery, 4 hours to transfuse, flush and then monitor for an hour after.... by then the receiving hospital can close their window til the following day because the receiving admitting doctor won't be there.

[glinda]

90. I know as we have been through most of this.

[freebrew]

59. If we hire more people...

like said above, profits go down. Everyone's 401K is invested in this shit.
We were all almost forced to join up to get robbed and fired.

Great plan, eh?

[Enthusiast]

61. This is what happens when there is a profit motive in health care.

Naturally the bean counters try to slash staff to get the payroll down. The consumer suffers.

We need a Not-For-Profit single payer health care system NOW!

[ctsnowman]

77. X 1000

[Dont call me Shirley]

63. The first problem to restructure is the pyramid-shaped social structure. Never worked before,

still isn't working, won't work in the future. Even for the top of the pyramid, none of those 1%ers are truly happy anyway, that's why they keep working desperately at destroying ours.

Let's refuse to continue living this way.

[Logical]

64. You know this stuff has happened all the time correct? There is always mistakes made.....

Pilots crash planes, doctors misdiagnose stuff, truck drivers kill people, boats takes down bridges. Nothing new.

[Nye Bevan]

65. How many staffers does the Secret Service need to lock the front door of the White House? (nt)

[vanlassie]

66. Hmm. You imply maybe only one? So if your family was living there,

I assume that would suffice for you.

[whereisjustice]

71. when they laid-off a huge number of people, they told those remaining they

need to work twice as hard for less pay and no vacation. Meanwhile the CEO got a $1 million dollar/yr raise.

That's what work in America has become. Now they are experimenting with no vacation or benefits in professional jobs.

We need to learn how to protect ourselves from the evil that has become the 1%.

[the_sly_pig]

72. Excess money in the private sector is called profit.

Excess money in the public sector is called waste. Profit only benefits individuals while our communities bicker over crumbs. The argument isn't about having enough money as there is plenty of that. The argument is its distribution.

[ctsnowman]

76. Everyone

I know is working at an understaffed workplace. Companies have cut all the way to the bone and the system is going to break.

[LeftishBrit]

78. YES!

There is this dreadful idea that 'efficiency' means 'employing as few staff as possible'. As a result - the public suffers from understaffing of vital services, while at the same time unemployment is a perennial problem.

[AngryOldDem]

79. I think it's a game with corporate America anymore to see what they can get away with.

How low can they cut staffing, how thin can they spread their employees, before things blow up.

This getting by on the cheap will most definitely be the death of us. But hey, it's cool for the bottom line!

[Scruffy Rumbler]

80. And woe be unto the employee

that in their exasperation should say " Sorry for your wait, we are very busy and understaffed!"For if your words shall fall onto the ears of thy management... you shall be reamed out! For unto the laws of greedy owners and lackey managers, six shall do the work of 10 and it shall be done well!

[lonestarnot]

86. Yep.

[L0oniX]

88. Side note: There are NO doctors in Pinellas county that accept ACA.

There are 3 clinics that accept ACA and only have a practical nurse on staff. Yep ...it's Florida.