Abstract
The purpose of the present study is to develop indicators to estimate nursing staffing needs based on patients' care needs.
Data on the degrees of nursing needs and patients' classification was collected by a cross-sectional survey in October 2006, including 3,827 in-patients of 25 nursing units in 6 teaching hospitals. The patients' age was 66.8±16.9 years and the length of hospital stay was 17.3±7.8 days. In regard to the degree of nursing necessities, patients were classified under a nursing quantitative adjustment indicator, A-I=1.5, B-I=1.4, C-I=1.3, A-II=1.3, B-II=1.2, C-II=1.1, A-III=1.1, A-IV=1.1, B-III=1.0, C-III=1.0, B-IV=1.0, and C-IV=1.0. The number of patients with high care needs (A-I) were 1.5 times higher than those with low care needs (B-III, C-III, B-IV, C-IV).
