'Defining Moment' for Nursing: Joint Commission Recognizes Staffing as Quality Component
The Joint Commission will formally recognize RN staffing as a national performance goal—effective January 1, 2026. TJC hospitals will need to meet certain standards related to staffing and oversight. The American Nurses Association (ANA) applauds the changes.
The article in Becker's Hospital Review frames the Joint Commission’s decision to formally recognize staffing as a quality-of-care component as a “defining moment” for nursing, elevating nurse staffing from an operational challenge to an organizational performance metric. It argues that accreditation and regulatory bodies will increasingly hold hospitals accountable for safe staffing levels, pushing nursing leaders to develop transparent, data-driven models. Organizations may consider benchmarking nurse-to-patient ratios, skill mix, and overtime rates against industry standards to prepare for these new regulatory changes.
This article falls under Human Capital and Legal/Regulatory in the Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) risk domains.
Human Capital
This domain refers to the organization’s workforce. This is an important issue in today’s tight labor and economic markets. Included are risks associated with employee selection, retention, turnover, staffing, absenteeism, on-the-job work-related injuries (workers’ compensation), work schedules and fatigue, productivity and compensation. Human capital associated risks may cover recruitment, retention, and termination of members of the medical and allied health staff.
Legal/Regulatory
Risk within this domain incorporates the failure to identify, manage and monitor legal, regulatory, and statutory mandates on a local, state and federal level. Such risks are generally associated with fraud and abuse, licensure, accreditation, product liability, management liability, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Conditions of Participation (CoPs) and Conditions for Coverage (CfC), as well as issues related to intellectual property.