patient ratio

Hi everyone,

I was hoping to get some input about staffing ratio's. I work on a cardiac PCU. We have Dopamine/Dobutrex drips, Cardizem, NTG, Lidocaine and the like. We have no LPN's - a tele tech, unit secretary, and 2 techs for 24 pts or 3 techs if more than 30 pts. Most days as a RN we are assigned 7 pts. I just feel so overwhelmed. I am a new nurse and just can't seem to wrap my head around 7 pts that are going for stress tests, direct admits, post surgical overflow sometimes, ER admits, cath patients, and everything that goes into taking care of 7 patients. Any ideas???

As a nurse outside the US, could you tell me the role of these unfamiliar terms:
tech, LPN, aid, CNA, NA and a HUS? Ta

get over the florida thing........sorry i keep getting emails from "why would anyone want to live in florida" have been here 43 years and love it but that is a different forum
I work in a level 1 trauma center 4:1 "closed unit"no floating ever!. if you have IMCU patients its 3:1. the heart surgical unit is at the end of our unit and they have 8 beds...we don't float there but they are available for questions, codes and since we get there post op patients POD 1 or 2, the RN will come see the patient to say hi and see how they are doing. The regular ICU units are 2:1 or 1:1 depending on the patients...
There are tele floors that have 1:5 or 1:7 ratio but I don't work there as a new RN of 2 years but all floors have monitor techs and on my floor there are 4 nurses, one charge nurse, and one pca after 2300, one pca is 3-11 shift..great floor, everyone helps one another and we have drips, titrations, IMCU but more caridac now than anything else...the docs love our unit and if they are a patient they come to us..I had two docs as patients last week and several weeks before the father of the chief of staff...always fun, always busy and I love my job in florida...starting the weekend shift for $10 more an hour for 13 weeks! (that is $700 more every 2 weeks!)only on nights which i love...I would not do a 7-1 ratio on any floor, good luck to anyone that can............