[RADONC-RN]

Hi everyone. Can anyone share with me their nurse to pt ratio in Outpt chemo departments and Radiation departments please? very curious as to the "average".Thanks

[Mermaid]

Im not sure if you are interested in the inpatient oncology depart... we hang chemo on our floor as well. I will have anywhere from 5 to 9 patients a night. It doesnt matter if I am hanging chemo on one or more of my patients we still keep those numbers. We sometimes get a break if we are doing chemo belly baths on patients and will only have to care for a few other patients at that same time.

[Sailingshoes]

We have one radiation nurse for anywhere from 15 to 20 pts on tx and 2 chemo nurses for hopefully not more than 8 pts infusing at once - In an outpatient clinic. No CNAs or Techs.

[Dignan]

I'm a nurse on an inpatient unit and our ratio is 4:1.

[me5115]

i work in a extremely busy out pt clinic, there is one infusion RN and a LPN that helps out although he cant hang the chemo. we have 8 chairs and 2 beds. somedays we have up to 17 infusions. our radonc department runs seperately with one RN but it is all in the same building. there are usually 3-4 RN doing assessments, drawing blood ect.

[mom4josh]

Originally Posted by Mermaid

Im not sure if you are interested in the inpatient oncology depart... we hang chemo on our floor as well. I will have anywhere from 5 to 9 patients a night. It doesnt matter if I am hanging chemo on one or more of my patients we still keep those numbers. We sometimes get a break if we are doing chemo belly baths on patients and will only have to care for a few other patients at that same time.

What is a "chemo belly bath" please. Never heard of that, and I have been working inpatient oncology for 5 years.


P.S. We usually have 5-6 on all shifts.

[miko014]

Sounds like IP chemo to me...but I've never heard it called a "belly bath" either.

[ORSmurf]

I just started working at an outpatient cancer center. There are 10 chairs - one infusion nurse for non-chemo treatments get 2 chairs, and 2 chemo nurses get the rest. It seems to be very busy most of the time. So, I guess for the chemo nurses it's 4:1. I'm still so new it's really scary to me because it feels sort of chaotic all day. I'm still deciding if it's the place for me. I feel way too paniced and rushed all day. This is not something I want to ever make an error with! I have the rest of this week and next week of orientation, then I'll have to decide if it's something I can handle or not. I hope I can learn a lot in the next week, because I'd really love for this to work out - I love the patients!

[NovaScotianGal]

I work on an in-pt. unit, that is mostly Heme. pts and our ratio is 4:1, sometimes 5:1.

p.s. I've never heard of 'belly bath chemo' either . I'm I missing out on something here? I've been working Heme/Onc. for 8 years....

[Lainee]

my guess is belly bath is IP chemo too??

I am inpatient. Med/Surg mix. anywhere from 4:1 to 7:1 on days or 5:! or 9:1 on nights. Purely depends on staffing. My unit staffs well but we get pulled often leaving us with more patients.

We try to give nurses with chemo less patients but doesn't always work. Nurses with a stem cell patient usually get less though and it's 1:1 on reinfusion day.