Metropolis Health System (MHS) uses a basic work week of 40 hours throughout the system. Thus, one full-time employee works 40 hours per week. MHS also uses a standard 24-hour scheduling system of three 8-hour shifts. The Director of Nursing needs to compute the staffing requirements to fill the Operating Room (OR) positions. Since MHS is a trauma center, the OR is staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. At present, staffing is identical for all 7 days of the week, although the Director of Nursing is questioning the efficiency of this method.

The Operating Room department is staffed with two nursing supervisors on the day shift and one nursing supervisor apiece on the evening and night shifts. There are two technicians on the day shift, two technicians on the evening shift, and one technician on the night shift. There are three RNs on the day shift, two RNs on the evening shift, and one RN plus one LPN on the night shift. In addition, there is one aide plus one clerical worker on the day shift only.

Required

• 1.Set up a staffing requirements worksheet, using the format in the example.
• 2.Compute the number of FTEs required to fill the Operating Room staffing positions.

Example

Emergency Department Scheduling for 8-Hour Shifts:

Shift 1 Day Shift 2 Evening Shift 3 Night = 24-Hour Scheduling Total

Position:

Emergency Room Intake 1 1 1 = 3 8-hour shifts

To Cover Position

7 Days per Week

Equals FTEs of: 1.4 1.4 1.4 = 4.2 FTEs

One full-time employee works 40 hours per week. One 8-hour shift per day times 7 days per week equals 56 hours on duty. Therefore, to cover 7 days per week or 56 hours requires 1.4 times a 40-hour employee (56 hours divided by 40 hours equals 1.4), or 1.4 FTEs.