Section Two: Developing Organizational Policies and Practices Competing Needs Impacting the COVID-19 Pandemic in Healthcare

The need for enough qualified professionals to provide nursing education during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the need for enough appropriate equipment and a safe environment for the healthcare personnel in the workplace to use the educational skills, are two competing necessities affecting the organization’s COVID-19 pandemic in the healthcare setting. For reskilling the health sector, the company has an insufficient number of qualified professionals. The capacity to retrain the nurses required to curb the pandemic may be hampered by a scarcity of skilled experts. As a result, the organization has a competing need to obtain more specialists to close the gap and ensure that the company has sufficient professionals and is training the organizational nurses regularly (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2011). The other competing requirement is the necessity for the availability of enough right equipment and a safe work environment for healthcare personnel during the pandemic. However, the right equipment can be complicated because it involves a lot of investing, suppliers, and even money. The diversity of safe healthcare equipment such as PPEs requires professionals and practitioners with the required expertise, competency, and ability to give high-quality care. As a result, the healthcare facility must invest in safety equipment and qualified professionals capable of providing high-quality care while meeting regulatory and legal specifications and sustaining a competitive edge over other healthcare institutions.      

Practice Influencing the Stressor

The need for administrative nursing staff to regularly participate in continued professional growth is a policy and practice that can influence enough skilled professionals to provide nursing education that will be useful during crises such as the COVID-19 crisis. Nursing staff in the healthcare sector are also expected to attend all institutional training conferences and workshops to improve their competencies and skills. The nursing workforce must continuously update their professional expertise, knowledge, practice, and principles to deliver maximum quality care and meet shifting healthcare demands (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2011). As a result, our company has a policy requiring all healthcare nursing staff to participate in formal or informally continuous professional growth. The healthcare industry is constantly evolving, particularly regarding technology, emphasizing the importance of policy.

The Policy for Ethical Considerations, The Policy’s Strengths and Challenges

The policy encourages administrative nursing staff to advance their careers and additional skills. The healthcare staff is obligated to follow the relevant standards of practice and code of ethics on an ethical level. In addition, the policy mandates that all healthcare professionals in the organization participate in professional growth. As a result, the policy aids in creating a work environment in which all organizational employees have equal accessibility to develop their knowledge and skills, resulting in a positive and mentoring workplace (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2011). More notably, ethically, nursing staff must have the necessary skills to give high-quality care by the standards of practice.

The significant advantage of this policy is that it provides equality of opportunity for all organizational employees to enhance their competencies and skills. This policy has aided in developing healthy workplace relationships among nursing staff. This policy has also ascertained that the nursing staff does not give substandard care. Fortunately, there are no noticeable challenges facing the policy in promoting ethics.

Recommendation of Policy or Practice Changes to Balance the Competing Needs

A stricter policy regarding safety equipment, a safe working environment, and patient safety is required regarding implementing personal rights. Organizations are ethically obligated to strictly adhere to the code of individual rights and make sure that nobody’s right is disrespected, even when working during a disease crisis or outbreak. Implementation of the most up-to-date personal rights in response to being involved in the healthcare sector is one of the competing needs. As a result, policies addressing individual rights and a safe working environment must be implemented. Healthcare facilities are legally required to protect the rights of the nursing staff and patients to follow all applicable laws and regulations and provide enough equipment. Specifically, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) demands employers follow OSHA’s or a state’s OSHA-enacted state plan’s health and safety standards and rules (Michaels & Barab, 2020). Furthermore, in the Act