Cost-Effectiveness of Deploying More Nurses on Hospital Wards
Low nurse staffing can harm patients, but are the costs of fixing the problems worth the benefits or are there cost-effective alternatives?
By Peter Griffiths and Zoé Ejebu, 15 October 2025
The NHS, along with many health systems worldwide, faces shortages of registered nurses. Common sense and a vast body of evidence suggest that this is far from ideal for delivering high-quality patient care.
In acute general hospitals, when there are fewer registered nurses, more patient care is missed, quality is reduced, and patient outcomes are worse.
However, fixing the problem is likely to be expensive, and it is crucial to ask whether this is the best way to spend money in a resource-limited system.
Low nurse staffing can harm patients, but are the costs of fixing the problems worth the benefits or are there cost-effective alternatives?
Author's summary: Deploying more nurses may not be cost-effective despite its benefits.