Determining Cost of Nursing Interventions: A beginning

Creating more sophisticated models that describe and value nursing care will enable more sophisticated management of nursing resources. The authors used the Nursing Interventions Classification (NIC) as the basis for describing actions performed by nurses. Nursing experts evaluated each intervention in order to assign the time required for each task and the minimum level of education required to perform each task. Fifty-four percent of the interventions were determined to require fewer than 30 minutes. Over 70% of the interventions in the NIC were deemed to require basic RN education to per-form them safely and appropriately. With the time and skill level required to complete each intervention, a cost per intervention can be determined. Assigning overhead cost per intervention and a corresponding charge will enable more effective contracting for nursing services in the health care marketplace.