[gauge14iv]

Make sure you have copies of that tape in several formats and stored in several places.

[Faeriewand]

LadyCharge, you said,
"Is anyone aware that Governor Swartzenegger is no longer governor of California? Did you know a major reason he was voted out is because teachers and NURSES joined ranks "Politically" to vote him out a second term?"

I live in CA and Gov Swartzenegger is still our Gov. There has been no election for Gov yet. We had a special election that he called and his propositions did not pass. That's all. <wink>

[LadyCharge]

Originally Posted by Faeriewand

LadyCharge, you said,
"Is anyone aware that Governor Swartzenegger is no longer governor of California? Did you know a major reason he was voted out is because teachers and NURSES joined ranks "Politically" to vote him out a second term?"

I live in CA and Gov Swartzenegger is still our Gov. There has been no election for Gov yet. We had a special election that he called and his propositions did not pass. That's all. <wink>

I have a good friend whose a pastor that lives in Oakland and told me this the night before last. Since I live in Florida I do not keep up with all the news there. However, I did hear Swartzeneggar speaking on our news channel recently, appealing with what the media said was a "humility tactic" apologizing for his mistakes as an effort to get re-elected. My friend keeps up with these issues and he informed me that the teachers and nurses in California are angry with him for cutting programs and giving them to other special interest groups. He said that he is not going to be re-elected. Obviously, with your claim this has not happened yet. However, this doe not detract the reality that nurses in your state are successful in getting laws passed in terms of nurse/patient ratios and organizing unions. In my opinion, the nurses in California are setting a standard thats been long overdue and leading the way for the rest of us throughout the nation to take notice and start doing something about this!

May God empower us as we take a strong stand for justice and righteousness
for our sick and those of us who care for them.

Thank you for the tid pit of info however!

[TNNURSE]

It is about time that nurses have more of a political influence.We have all these Nurse Pratice acts, Standards of Conduct, Ethics policies etc. etc... but,....when you actually utilize those standards and policies to protect the patients and the facilities in which we work what happens? I have been the "victim" of what happens. Retaliation occurs, your life is turned upside down, the stability you have become accustomed to with your job is gone, you suffer, your patients suffer, your coworkers suffer, M&M ratios rise. Some topics are "taboo".It is like the healthcare industry makes sure they have all these policies and standards....but they are merely words on paper.Policies are meaningless words...it is a HC facilities actions that speak volumes.If I had not been so meticulous in my record keeping...and if I hadnt taped my termination interview...I would have been labeled a disgruntled terminated employee.My work history at my hospital would have been ignored.I would have had little protection from the false accusations. I worry about the ones out there that are even more niave than I am. What will happen to them when they see a nurse praticing unsafely/incompetently and follow the Nurse Pratice Act and report them? Alot of these Nurse Pratice acts MANDATE we report unsafe praticing nurses...however...some states do not have the retaliatory protection included in those Nurse Pratice Acts. I am lucky. Although retaliation is not addressed directly in our states nUrse Pratice act...I am covered under many other statutes that do apply and make it illegal(my termination).What about all the other states though? We need this topic specifically covered in all the Nurse Pratice Acts...every state.

[TsunamiKim]

BE VERY WELL PREPARED AT YOUR HEARING AND BRING WIRNESSES. Sorry, I do not have faith in your system any more. I am originally from the UK, but I was married to an American and lived in the US for over twenty years. I was a US citizen living in Maryland, but I left feeling deeply betrayed, in debt, destitute, a virtual refugee. So much for the American dream; I found a US nightmare of horrendous injustice. The dirty tricks, lies, fraud and cheating perpetrated by my Hospital shook my faith in everything America supposedly stands for. My family and friends here are stunned that my former Hospital, the “Best Hospital in America,” was able to get away with what they did. Many of their tactics would have been illegal in the UK and I would have bought them up on criminal charges.
At one point during an EEOC hearing I asked everyone in the room to stand up and take note of the time, it was 10:00AM. Then I asked them to imagine that they were compelled to remain standing for the next 12hours, until 10:00PM, without even a sip of water, with nothing to eat, no chance to run to the bathroom, cannot sit, can only touch a limited sterile area, cannot even scratch your own nose, but wait there's more... At the same time you must concentrate on the task at hand, anticipate the needs of the Surgeon, pass tiny sutures as fine as a human hair, but in case you even consider abandoning your post the critically ill liver transplant patient is on bypass so you stick it out for 12hours straight. Was anyone horrified by this? No.
Under the Geneva Convention you cannot treat a working POW in such an inhumane manor. All they had to say was “the ER was busy,” but they didn't have to substantiate it. And yes I was in the OR. Then I was expected to prove I had asked for a break! I was almost comatose by the time the Surgery was over. At one point during my Arbitration I was asked by their lawyer: “are you trying to tell us you are more important than the Surgeon.” I could barely contain my fury when I said: “No one is more important that the patient unconscious on the OR table.” The Nurse Manager who had pulled this stunt on me several times was never disciplined, but when I had complained about the situation no one considered how becoming sick, dizzy and faint might compromise my patient. I tried to change an assignment that would have meant working virtually alone with this abusive Manager every weekend. As far as they were concerned I was the problem; I was a danger to the patients so they forced me to take time off without pay. I was targeted for removal and then fired.
They got impatient after I did not just quit due to the forced time off; I was supposed to go look for another job. They tried the phone call trick while I was at home worrying about how I was going to cover my mortgage. My Manager tried to bait me into getting angry; I told her that I thought she was being "unnecessarily inflexible" with my schedule. This innocuous comment was escalated into "Verbal Abuse." It sounded so ridiculous they doctored it up a bit by accusing me of screaming into the phone. They tried to pretend that this telephone screaming match had happened within hearing range of the top OR Manager so she was a witness. How could the Directory of Surgical Nursing be called into question? Just saying that what I was falsely accused of was a blatant lie was twisted into yet another charge of defaming a Manager. Unfortunately another phone in my house had been knocked off the wall by workman and he slammed it down; all I heard was a bang and I thought the Manager had run to a stat call in the OR. Explanations were futile as they only needed the flimsiest of excuses to fire me, they added their screaming and abuse embellishments latter.
They then duped a couple off the office staff into writing letters that the referred to as "letters of outrage." One of these letters was written by the then very new secretary of that same Director of Surgical Nursing, who had been coaxed into writing that she had felt “threatened.” Without bothering to elaborate on why these employees had had such obscure subjective feelings of endangerment these letters were wide open to manipulation by my unscrupulous Managers. When asked at my Arbitration Hearing why she felt “threatened” she had said that I had my hands on my hips in an aggressive manor and I had had my arms folded in an aggressive posture. How about that for freedom of expression in a so called free country! These letters were so obviously inadequate, solicited and contrived that they had to be deliberately kept from me for over 8months. They refused to even put a quote from the letters in writing while they kept lying about the content.
There was no documentation of what I had said or done just two vague one liners that constituted the charge and the strange subjective comments in the letters that were shown to EEOC behind my back. The mediator told me she was thoroughly convinced by some type of fake phone log that I had made over 50 harassing phone calls to my Supervisor, this was a new charge. I was not allowed to see this evidence, part of the grossly unfair standard EEOC policy I was told. Then I was offered an $8500 bribe if I would write a letter of resignation. Despite making it quite clear that the termination would continue to sabotage my career if I did not comply with their wishes, I refused their bribe. Would you offer a dangerous threatening employee who was engaging in a pattern of criminal telephone harassment of her former Manager one cent?
It is very hard to defend yourself when there is nothing submitted in writing that you are permitted to see! So much for “due process.” There has never been any full documentation of what I said or did to warrant being fired. No specific charges against me beyond: “disruptive behavior in the OR.” For Management vague is good. The same top Director of Surgical Nursing should have won an Oscar for her harrowing performance when she lied under oath at my Arbitration. She said that I got in her face and started screaming at her: she felt in danger for her life. All this never mentioned before, never documented, no call to security. The entire room knew she was lying, but no one questioned why someone of her rank would lie under oath.
Did it matter that nothing actually happened, there were no harassing phone calls, no threats, no screaming at people. No, the point is that if they do not have a valid reason they will concoct one. If you have a similar experience just keep documenting the lies as this will be their undoing if you go to court. If your clinical practice cannot be badly discredited then they will go for the “disruptive” and marginally insane approach. You are a prime target for this false charge as they will have difficulty showing incompetence on one wrong documentation time: it screams vindictive. Beware of the telephone as they can pretend that witnesses overheard the call as they did with me. Do not be lulled into feeling secure that they do not have anything to charge you with; if they don’t have any genuine allegations they will make them up. They are covering up negligence that endangers peoples lives believe me they will target you. Brace yourself for this assault as they will cheat and lie to get you out of there. I worry that you have too much confidence in your innocence. Your innocence is just collateral damage for them. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best.
The really sick thing is that Hospitals are supporting Managers like this precisely to get rid of conscientious tenure Nurses like you. You are probably on the upper end of the pay scale; a new grad is a far cheaper option. My Hospital valued the toxic Manager who abandoned me in Surgery and thereby compromised the care of my patient. That one Manager was responsible for dozens of really good OR Nurses leaving our Hospital and the administration were laughing all the way to the bank.
The Hospital rolled the Nurses vacation time and sick time into one PTO bank to deprive them of a weeks holiday. Then they gave fat bonuses to the travelers to stay on for a few more weeks while their regular staff got dumped on with excessive call. I went to an upper level Manager and said we had a real problem, we were hemorrhaging Nurses and I had ideas for Nurse retention. I was a Surgical Tech, not even a Nurse, but I cared about what was going on because it impacted our patients. She just said: "this happens every once in a while." They deliberately make it happen regularly; trying to purge the OR of all the most experienced Nurses and replace them with cheaper fresh out of Nursing school compliant labor. They used mandated overtime while they squealed about the "Nursing Shortage." This is being repeated all over the US, cheap labor not quality care.
At your hearing expect the worst. Expect them to lie and concoct a few additional charges, they will. Take witnesses and document everything. Even though I have had to leave the US for good I still want reinstatement. This is important even if it is just for a few days as a symbolic gesture. This is important because it would show my former coworkers that if you do the right thing, advocate for your patients and speak out in the end you will be vindicated. Write to advocacy groups, Senators, public agencies, everyone; just keep writing, keep fighting and don't give up. Remember:

"the Pen is Mightier than the Sword," Kim.

[LadyCharge]

Kim,
I'm so sorry for everything the U.S. Healthcare System has done to you. Sadly, evil is alive and well in the hearts of self-seeking men and women and free enterprise has been corrupted in using our poor, elderly, and terminally ill and it matters not to the administrators and board of directors how hard we work for 12 hours plus, with no breaks and even a pathetic 30 minute lunch! Many times I felt like I need to insert a foley cath attached to a leg bag while putting on a pair of roller skates to take care of far too many patients...the average being 8-9 on a Med-Surg unit....and those patients SHOULD HAVE been in PCU because of the acuity as well as the diagnosis and prognosis...many needed to be monitored much closer and managers knew it, physicians knew it, and administration knew it, but the reason they did nothing is because PCU was already full. So here I am with the other nurses on my unit taking care of PCU patients...except not 4 which is standard for this type of patient...but 8! And all the nurses tolerated it while they complained to each other, but never to management. Very typical.

I have a very good understanding what you went through as I have also worked in the OR and also in plastics. Personally, I feel that RN's should be regarded in the same light as a physician! We are professionals yet regarded as subserviant and the lawyer who questioned you thinks much too highly of himself and physicians. They do not have a clue! Many times I bailed a physician out of trouble and saved his butt! I doubt I will ever go back to work in a hospital again; unless I were to give another shot in California where working conditions have improved. Nursing has been the most demeaning career I have had and I served in the U.S. Military which is far more professional and appreciative of its staff.

Health Care in the U.S. is all nothing but BIG BUSINESS and PROFITS, capitalizing off the sick. This should not be so. But politicians turn their heads and look away, until enough of us get angry enough about it and unite to force changes. Alas! Nothing like forced cooperation...and such is the nature of mankind short of an awakening.

Blessings to you and your family and take heart that many of your sister nurses empathasize because we have walked in your shoes as we too endured this kind of abuse.

This is not for me any longer however. I have decided I have other talents I am going to cultivate and earn my living in a different career. Until then, I remain constant in trying to make a difference for nurses in the U.S.

[scampi710]

It is time for us to unite as a profession----across the country. The fact that a Magnet Hospital (number one in the country....Baltimore, MD.) is not much different than those in the south and in Texas blares a voluminous signal to all of us who are professional and care about the lives and well being of the patients who entrusted themselves to our care.

The motive of the hospital upper echelon, the motive of the insurance companies, the motive of the corpration, whether they call themselves profit or non-profit, is indeed profit.

Non profit simply means they can not SHOW A PROFIT, and has nothing to do with not making a profit.

Those monies are distributed to the CEO's, CFO's, etc. in the forms of non-taxable benefits, perks and bonus'.

Time to wake up fellow RNs. We need to take a stand to protect our patients and not protect the system.

We need national unity and it needs to start with our involvement in our State Boards of Nursing Practice.

A nurse's place in is her/his union.

[Cute_CNA]

TNNurse,

You are in Texas?

I like the idea of the tape recording. But. Did you get consent to record the other person before you started tape recording? It may be illegal to record someone w/o their knowledge in your state. You should find this out before you use it as evidence. If not, just keep it for your own use. I wouldn't tell anyone else about it, personally.

[TsunamiKim]

Good advice: you are right about informing the person you intend to tape; that is the law in Maryland. You are able to tape if you inform the person you intend to tape. However, his really puts them on guard, because Management rely on he said/she said where they will always claim more credibility than you. If you don’t tape your next hearing you must at least bring witnesses, preferably one that will transcribe what is said would be very useful. I kept asking at my hearings why they had never informed me that calls between myself and my Manager would need to be taped; this would have been a legitimate and logical course of action if indeed I had been making dozens of threatening phone calls.
That was one of the major inconsistencies in their lies. Who in their right mind would put up with dozens of harassing phone calls and take no action to stop the practice? At one point my Manager blurted out that my calls tied up her phone for up to five hours a day! But no one thought that such a ridiculous claim was bogus or questioned her total inaction as suspect, after all they had to be in the right. An OR Nurse Manager who failed to document anything at the time, did not send written warning that the behavior must stop and who never bother consulting with the Security Department. But Management at the most iconic institution in Maryland couldn’t possibly be suspected of lying under oath! That place was way beyond "Goliath." I call this unjust phenomenon "Iconic Immunity" as it is a privilege that I am sure is shared by other iconic facilities.
The inconsistencies in my case were massive, but totally ignored. I will never have my day in court as I was cheated out of that when the Union misinformed me regarding the Arbitration being binding. I only found out much later when I tried to hire a Lawyer. If there was any way I could testify under oath in a Government hearing or to a US Grand Jury, on the need for Whistleblower protections for healthcare workers, I would gladly return to the US in a heartbeat.
More than anything else I want to know that my sacrifices were worth it: that the necessary changes will be made and protections put in place. Of course I would also like vindictive Managers held accountable for wreaking my life. Personal vindication and taking back my self respect are the biggest Christmas Presents I could receive right now. No one should have to face a life-sentence of shame for daring to speak out to protect patients from harm. Getting my house back and paying off the debts I incurred trying to hang onto my home are beyond any hope of possibility, so I try not to even think about that dream anymore as it is unrealistic. This is the worst time of year for me as it is now the fifth anniversary of the day I was marched out of the OR surrounded by security guards as a warning to my coworkers of the perils of rocking the boat. It is also second anniversary of being forced to abandon my Baltimore home and leave the US as a virtual refugee.
I did not even have the resources to file for bankruptcy before I left so the bad debts still hang round my neck like the proverbial albatross. I contacted all the companies and told them I had been cheated out of any possibility of compensation and there was nothing I could do. I have mail forwarded here and at least one has decided to sue me. I will certainly never have a home of my own again.
I will also have to forgo the security of a credit card just in case I need to fly myself back to the UK in an emergency from some volunteer assignment overseas. That is still my one greatest ambition, to continue the NGO Medical Volunteer work I began after the Asian tsunami. This is my driving force in maintaining a strong sense of purpose it really gives me hope. I wish that all of you many disillusioned, well meaning, overworked Nurses could find the special peace and sanctuary that I discovered living rough in my hammock/tent and working at Meulaboh's only remaining very badly supplied Hospital, Cut Nyak Dhien. Perhaps in dealing honestly with the injustice that clouds my past I can regain the credibility I so desperately need, to obtain support for my ambitious program in Aceh. If only I had the backing of my former prestigious Hospital instead I must continue to battle their lies. They should be deeply ashamed of their actions, but I doubt they will ever face the truth let alone apologize. Anyone who decides to blow the whistle on negligence and patient safety concerns needs to understand that the road ahead of them is a very tough challenge. We care so we take on the toughest of challenges, do not give up,
Fair Winds & Following Seas, Kim.

[CseMgr1]

Originally Posted by LadyCharge

Kim,
I'm so sorry for everything the U.S. Healthcare System has done to you. Sadly, evil is alive and well in the hearts of self-seeking men and women and free enterprise has been corrupted in using our poor, elderly, and terminally ill and it matters not to the administrators and board of directors how hard we work for 12 hours plus, with no breaks and even a pathetic 30 minute lunch! Many times I felt like I need to insert a foley cath attached to a leg bag while putting on a pair of roller skates to take care of far too many patients...the average being 8-9 on a Med-Surg unit....and those patients SHOULD HAVE been in PCU because of the acuity as well as the diagnosis and prognosis...many needed to be monitored much closer and managers knew it, physicians knew it, and administration knew it, but the reason they did nothing is because PCU was already full. So here I am with the other nurses on my unit taking care of PCU patients...except not 4 which is standard for this type of patient...but 8! And all the nurses tolerated it while they complained to each other, but never to management. Very typical.

I have a very good understanding what you went through as I have also worked in the OR and also in plastics. Personally, I feel that RN's should be regarded in the same light as a physician! We are professionals yet regarded as subserviant and the lawyer who questioned you thinks much too highly of himself and physicians. They do not have a clue! Many times I bailed a physician out of trouble and saved his butt! I doubt I will ever go back to work in a hospital again; unless I were to give another shot in California where working conditions have improved. Nursing has been the most demeaning career I have had and I served in the U.S. Military which is far more professional and appreciative of its staff.

Health Care in the U.S. is all nothing but BIG BUSINESS and PROFITS, capitalizing off the sick. This should not be so. But politicians turn their heads and look away, until enough of us get angry enough about it and unite to force changes. Alas! Nothing like forced cooperation...and such is the nature of mankind short of an awakening.

Blessings to you and your family and take heart that many of your sister nurses empathasize because we have walked in your shoes as we too endured this kind of abuse.

This is not for me any longer however. I have decided I have other talents I am going to cultivate and earn my living in a different career. Until then, I remain constant in trying to make a difference for nurses in the U.S.

I'm getting to that point, too. My current temporary position is going to end on the 15th. And even though they have other jobs posted in the same facility that I could probably do, my heart's not into it anymore. It isn't worth the hassle.