ED shortage?

Specialties Emergency

Published

Specializes in PACU, Surgery, Acute Medicine.

Do ED nurses ever get sent home if things are slow? I know it happens in med-surg, but I would think that in the ED, since they can't really accurately estimate the census in advance (except for long-term trends), they would need to keep everyone on hand.

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Specializes in Trauma/ED.

I have gone home early probably 2-3 times in 3 years in the ED but when I worked surgical floor I was called-off at least once a month. As agency I have been sent home twice in 2 yrs (in ED). In the ED our staffing is not census driven it is the same no matter what our dept looks like but there are times when we are over-staffed this is when someone can go home a little early (usually 1 hr or so where I work).

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Specializes in ED, Flight.

I think in the past year I've seen this happen in our ED maybe three or four times (nights). More often, we are understaffed.

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Specializes in Cardiac, ER.

I go home occasionally,.I work 7p-7a,..I might leave at 4a if it is really slow and for some reason we have a lot of staff. We are never forced to leave though,..I hate sitting around or doing "busy" work so I usually volunteer to leave.

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Specializes in ER.

2 or 3 times in the last 2 years, it was slow enough that I was sent home a few hours early, never a full shift

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Specializes in Emergency.

Very rarely are we sent home. Its usually always busy and if it is slow, it doesn't stay slow for long. And when you send people home, 5 minutes later you get a PNB coming in...so it ends up biting you in the butt when you play with ED staffing. When its slow and we've got a full staff, we make sure everyone gets a break before people start going home. I've worked at 2 different ED's and I've been sent home early once (it was a 12-hr shift and I left 2 hrs early, during a massive blizzard).

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

I worked level one trauma center for 10 years - never ever ever!

I now work in a smaller community hospital and have only been there a month but yes, it seems to happen there often.

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Specializes in ED, ICU, PSYCH, PP, CEN.

I work at 3 different ERs right now and it is so slow at each of them that all of us get sent home or cancelled on a regular basis. I hope it picks up soon.

Everyone is scheduling in 4 hour shifts now and looking at census every 2 hours and cancelling staff like crazy.

They know that since everyone is getting cut hours that if they really do get busy they can find someone to call in.

Some of the hospitals around me are actually laying off.

Why does this always happen right before the holidays. I am a little bummed.

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Specializes in M/S,TELE,ORTHO,ER.

I have worked at 4 different ERs/companies. Have been sent home early (and thanking my lucky stars.) Have also sent people home early pretty routinely when doing charge. In some respects it is a crazy thing to do. Usually I think to myself it's O.K. if it's only a couple of hours 'til shift change, but you know how that is...

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Specializes in Cath Lab, OR, CPHN/SN, ER.

I was let off early once. It was Christmas Eve, overstaffed (you were required to work either Christmas Eve or Day), and low census. I was glad too- I had some shopping to finish. LOL

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Wow....Our ED is so busy we are required to take 2 on-calls a month.

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Specializes in ER/Trauma.

We are offered the chance (but not required) to go home - by seniority of course.

I took the chance last month (too many obnoxious drunks in one night for me).

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