Pa. nurses celebrate passage of Patient Safety Act in state House
Long-awaited legislation that would limit the number of patients that hospitals can assign to an individual nurse passed in the Pennsylvania House on Wednesday with bipartisan support.
The Patient Safety Act, which specifies the number of patients per-nurse required in different hospital settings, passed with a 119-84 vote. Two Democrats voted against the bill, while 19 Republicans voted in favor of House Bill 106, which now goes to the state Senate for consideration.
Nurses and their unions have said high staff-to-patient ratios have contributed to high turnover and difficulty recruiting replacements, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic, when many experienced burnout from the harrowing nature of their work with gravely ill patients.
“This bill is not easy, but today we’re going to make a choice, and to me this is an easy choice. This is a choice to not only help nurses, but help hospitals,” state Rep. Thomas Mehaffie, R-Dauphin, said.
Mehaffie is co-prime sponsor of the bill with Rep. Kathleen Tomlinson, R-Bucks.
Mehaffie said lawmakers have heard the concerns of nurses for nearly two decades and the bill has evolved drastically in that time.
https://www.penncapital-star.com/health-care/pa-nurses-celebrate-passage-of-patient-safety-act-in-state-house/