QNT/561 Week 5 Inferential Statistics and Findings

Forest View Healthcare Center is a 300-bed hospital. In the last year, executive leaders of the hospital have recognized an increase in the patients’ length of stay. This increase impacts the number of beds available for potential incoming patients resulting in a loss of revenue for the hospital. There is some discussion among managers in the hospital that the nurse case managers are understaffed and are not able to safely discharge patients in an efficient manner. Executive leaders have tasked Team C with performing a business research study to discover if the current ratios are impacting patient length of stay.

Variables

Before conducting the study, dependent and independent variables must be identified. In an experiment, independent variables are those factors that are manipulated in order to measure the impact on the dependent variable (Ziemer, 2008). The independent variable for this project is the number of nurse case managers. The nurse case manager role is responsible for the discharge plan of each patient. The dependent variable is the patients’ length of stay. The length of stay for the patients is defined as the number of days each patient is in the hospital. The days, in this case end at 11:59 p.m. and begin at midnight. If a patient is admitted at 11:00 a.m., the time of admission begins the patient’s first day. Each midnight that passes is an additional day for the patient.

Research Question

The research question the team has created is, “Does the ratio of nurse case managers to patients impact the patients’ length of stay?” Currently the ratio of nurse case managers to patients is 1:30. Each nurse case manager is assigned 30 patients per day to screen and assess for discharge needs. Once the assessment is complete, the nurse case manager then coordinates the discharge for each patient to include any necessary post hospital needs, such as placement in a facility or home health care needs.

Hypothesis Statements

The hypothesis statements for the project are as follows:

· When the nurse case manager to patient ratio increases, the patient length of stay increases.

· When the nurse case manager to patient ratio decreases, the patient length of stay decreases.

Conclusion

At Forest View Healthcare Center, the hospital is facing the dilemma of understaffing for the nurse case manager role. This could be the cause of inefficient discharge plans for the patients, impacting length of stay. Team C has declared the dependent and independent variables, the research question, and hypothesis statements in preparation for the research project.

References

Ziemer, H. (2008). Variables. Retrieved from onlinestatbook.com/2/introduction/variables.html

Create an inferential statistics (hypothesis) test using the research question and two variables your learning team developed for the Week 2 Business Research Project Part 1 assignment. Include:

· The research question

· Mock data for the independent and dependent variables

Determine the appropriate statistical tool to test the hypothesis based on the research question.

Conduct a hypothesis test with a 95% confidence level, using the statistical tool.

Write an interpretation of no more than 350-words of the results and provide your findings.

Format your paper consistent with APA guidelines.

Submit both the spreadsheet and the paper to the Assignment Files tab.