Do you feel like your differentials make up for the lack of staffing at night? I love working nights and the crew of people I work with, but I absolutely hate how short staffed we are when compared to day shift! I am a cna on a BUSY med/surg floor where our census ranges anywhere between 30-38 patients. Day shift can have anywhere from 6-7 nurses, including the charge nurse taking patients, and 3-4 aides on the floor with sitters available. Then when it comes to nights we may have only 4-5 nurses, and 2 aides on the floor and maybe a sitter if the need is that great. On nights I can start out with 14 pts and can count on ER in brining me 2 or more patients to add to my census. Management doesn't take into account the type of care needed for each patients. They think everybody will be asleep needing less care. WRONG! There are times when I've had 15 pts, 6 of which were total cares requiring two people to help change and turn and can often be heavy wetters needing a bed change. Lets not forget the other patients who are 1x assist to the commode every other hour and you just wish they had an order for a catheter because their output is about 100mL each time. Then we have combative patients determine to pull their tele, iv, shiley, picc, catheter, and any other tubing in site in no restriants because the family is staying in the room. Our confused patients trying to hop out of bed, so of course bed alarms are going off. To complete the night, multiple trips to the snack room for low BS, answering call lights, and assisting with RR transporting pts to the unit. Granted not everything happens all in one shift, but it comes pretty darn close.
To answer my own question, I say no! They don't pay us enough for all the work we do at night. Not that I am soley about the money, it's just we work entirely way to hard the way we are staff and the pay just doesnt reflect our work. Budget cuts are also hurting us and 70% of our reimbursement will come from good scores from random patient surveys and ours scores are not great, which equals little reimbursements. I just wish they would put 3 aides on the floor at night because it makes a huge difference and relieves some of the stress of the night with all the new night admissions. I love doing what I do and will be starting nursing school this month, but I can't help but feel like I am being spread so thin! Maybe it's just the med/surg enviroment I'm not a fan of. I like staying busy, but this is just ridiculous. During our monthly meetings, the staffing issues has been discussed, but still remains the same. If management could grant 3 wishes, better staffing, new vital machines, and better pay are all I need to be happy camper :)
