Staffing
The allocation of nursing personnel to meet client care needs safely based on patient acuity, census, and unit needs.
Staffing items usually arrive as a prioritization question: the charge nurse is short-handed and must decide who covers which patients, or which client a float or agency nurse can safely take. The exam’s “tell” is a mismatch between acuity and skill—keep the least stable, least predictable client with the most experienced RN, and route the stable, predictable client to the float, agency nurse, or LPN/LVN (treat any floated nurse as new to the unit and assign similar-acuity work). When ideal ratios collide with a short-staffing crisis, the move is to reprioritize and notify the supervisor.
Don’t blur three layers: staffing is the macro headcount-to-census/acuity match for the whole unit; assignment directs staff to work already within their authorized role or job description; delegation transfers a specific task to a team member while the RN keeps accountability. And mandated nurse-to-patient ratios aren’t nationwide—California (AB 394, in force since 2004) is the long-standing model, while many states instead require staffing committees or set no fixed ratio at all.
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