Heart Failure Clinic Resourcing Plan

The staffing mix in the clinic will be comprised of both clinical and non-clinical teams which will work to ensure a holistic approach to patient care. The team will consist of; two clinical nurse specialists (CRN) who will lead the unit’s operations in consultation with the cardiologist lead, a cardiologist, 4 registered nurses (RN), 2 dieticians, 2, social workers, unit information systems officer, pharmacist and a front office assistant. The nursing staff requirements for the clinic which will be operating on a daily 8-hour shifts basis (no night time shifts) will include two clinical nurse specialists on 1. 0 full-time equivalent (FTE). The two each expected to work for 40 hours a week for 52 weeks a year will be necessary to ensure maximum coverage of the clinic throughout allowing them time for vacation, sick-offs and leave (Society of Human Resources Management, 2018).

00 CRN 2 8. 00 RN1 8. 00 RN2 8. 00 RN3 8. 00 RN4 8. This arrangement will reduce the staffing cost saving on the costs of paying for an additional cardiologist and physician support. The certified registered clinical nurses will be delegated by the chief of cardiology the duty to manage the day-to-day running of the clinic in liaison with the chief of cardiology. The delegation of administrative duty will ensure that the clinic is nurse-led and removes the need for hiring a clinic manager as the nurses can manage and offer patient care at the same time. Union contracts represent agreed staffing levels and pay schedules as well as working hours for the different cadres. Such contracts can impact on the allocation of the staffing time, the staff mix and level of experience or training for the staff to be employed at the clinic (Dube, Kaplan & Thompson, 2016).

Patient waiting time is indicative of the adequacy of the staff to meet the needs of the daily patient workload. I will also establish a workload monitoring schedule so as to assess the nursing staff per patient ratios and benchmark against the hospital policy standards (1:6 patient ratio). The cost-effectiveness of the staffing levels will be established by comparing the salary expenditure for the staffing in relation to the income generated by the unit. The cost-effectiveness will also be determined by comparing the cost to the hospital if the patients are seen within the outpatient at the hospital or whether a cheaper alternative such as linkages with other established outpatient facilities would be cheaper in caring for the patients. To establish effects of staffing mix on client outcomes, I will monitor the levels of collaboration between the staff, the number of cases referred to the cardiologists and the return-rate or impact of the interventions at the clinic on the rate of readmissions.