Development of an acuity-based nurse staffing system for the post anesthesia care unit (PACU)

The purposes of the study were (a) to provide an acuity-based method of determining nurse staffing needs for post anesthesia care units (PACUs) in the Army Medical Department (AMEDD) and (b) to provide a method of analyzing PACU workload variation. This method of determining staffing needs and analyzing workload variation is known as the Post Anesthesia Care Staffing System (PACS). Data were collected using (a) the PACU acuity worksheet (Carty, Rea, & Jennings, 1991) at six study sites for a 16-week period, (b) records of nursing hours worked when the acuity information was being collected, and (c) a survey of PACU characteristics sent to 39 Army PACUs in the U.S. Army Health Services Command (HSC, now the U.S. Army Medical Command or MEDCOM). The strong positive correlation (r > .90) between daily direct nursing care hours and patient volume supported the development of a general regression model that was used to estimate daily direct nursing care hours from patient volume information.