'When you have people getting injured every day, they're losing time at work, and the hospitals end up subbing for them by hiring high-cost nurses from personnel agencies,' she said. 'The hospitals are already facing a severe shortage of nurses and all health care workers. You would prevent nurses from suffering these chronic back injuries that cause them to leave the profession before they should. Plus, when patients aren't moved properly they get hurt and end up staying longer in the hospital.'
Assemblyman Robert Gordon, D-Fair Lawn, a co-sponsor of the legislation, said hospitals also would benefit from lower worker's compensation costs.
'Most of these devices are relatively inexpensive,' he said. 'They range from what you might describe as a super air mattress that you put under the patient and inflate, to devices where the patient is put in a sling and raised from a gurney to the bed. The problem is that the hospitals don't need to buy just one of these devices; they need to buy several for each unit.'
With the state's hospitals facing a fiscal crisis -- a report last week by the New Jersey Hospital Association found that hospitals' average operating margin shrank to less than 1 percent last year -- the legislative leadership is hesitant to enact any measures that puts additional financial pressure on them, Gordon added.
However, the state association has endorsed both bills.
'We're supportive of both [bills] as measures to keep our employees and our patients safe,' Randy Minniear, assistant vice president for legislation and policy at the New Jersey Hospital Association, said Friday.
He said earlier concerns about the costs of implementing some changes and how long hospitals would have to do so have been addressed with changes in the bills
Source link: http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzJmZnYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk3MjI5MTk5JnlyaXJ5N2Y3MTdmN3ZxZWVFRXl5Mg==
and just needs hard drive), two dressers and washer: Needed for a single mom with five kids. Call Toby at Counseling and Family Services, 676-2400.
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