OK I know there have been many threads lately on how much extra work nursing staff now does, but my god where is the limit?
Here is what I have seen in the past few years. CNA's we dont have them. Ward clerks, dont have them. Trays do get brought up, but we must deliver them to the rooms and pick them back up and then take the dirty ones back down.
Housekeeping: bare minimum--we wash the BSC and wipe down all the towers/counters and computers, we take out the trash--really all they do is floors and wipe off bed. We make the beds.
We do the stocking and all of the ordering. Materials mgmt brings up our supplies in card board boxes and leaves them at the nursing station, we put them away.
we do all the "charging" every night we need to mark down all the IM/Sub Q and IV meds given, how many hours they were on tele, if they are on feeding tubes etc etc etc for billing...granted all this stuff is on their MARS and in thier computer chart, but we need to put it on another form to give to billing as well.
Now lab is no longer coming up to the floors, nursing will draw all of the labs and deliver them to the lab in the basement. Lab no longer faxes results to us either, we need to log on to thier system and print them off ourselves.
Whats next, we get our own portable x ray machine and start taking our own x rays too? --are we going to start going over the bill and set up payment plan at time of dismisal?
I love being a nurse really I do, but I am starting to feel like not only a nurse but a housekeeper/accountant/stock girl/phlebotomist and most of all a customer service rep!!!
