Nurse-to-patient ratio and nurse staffing norms for hospitals in India: A critical analysis of national benchmarks

Optimum nurse-to-patient ratio is the concern of most of the nurse leaders globally. It has benefits both for nurses and patients; which is essential for patient's safety and quality of care. Some parts of the world such as California, USA, and Queensland, Australia has passed the law for the minimum nurse-to-patient ratio, which has scientifically found to be beneficial for the patients and healthcare system. Indian nurse staffing norms given by the Staff Inspection Unit, Indian Nursing Council, and Medical Council of India are developed through professional judgement models and are not updated. Five electronic databases were considered for literature search; in addition, grey literature and books were also searched. The primary outcome was to summarise exiting national nurse-to-patient norms and to find out the ideal nurse-to-patient ratio and nurse staffing norms as per Indian resources. It is concluded that nurse staffing norms must be immediately revised in the light of international norms and research evidence available in this regard. Further, there is a need for workload analysis based research evidence to have true nurse-to-patient ratio estimation for hospitals in India.