I cant take nursing anymore

dcurry · Mar 8, 2009

I am so in agreement with you on the "hotel" thing. All we hear from management is how we are expected to give "excellent" (not good or great) care! Well, I do want to give excellent care to my patients, but I do not want to be kissing their butts all day long. Our managers are constantly "rounding" on the floor and reminding the patients to "let us know if there's anything we can do to make your stay here more comfortable". Yeah, I want to make them comfortable, but I also want them to treat me with respect. I think we have taken the customer service thing a little too far and we encourage patients to treat doctors and nurses like servants. I even had one patient the other day to ask me to "scratch her right butt cheek!!!!" Was anything wrong with her arms? Noooooo. Had one to tell me that she had been instructed to report me if she had to wait more than 10 minutes for her pain meds (which I could understand if she were my only patient). Do you hear and feel my sarcasm?

Bugaloo · Mar 8, 2009

I am so in agreement with you on the "hotel" thing. All we hear from management is how we are expected to give "excellent" (not good or great) care! Well, I do want to give excellent care to my patients, but I do not want to be kissing their butts all day long. Our managers are constantly "rounding" on the floor and reminding the patients to "let us know if there's anything we can do to make your stay here more comfortable". Yeah, I want to make them comfortable, but I also want them to treat me with respect. I think we have taken the customer service thing a little too far and we encourage patients to treat doctors and nurses like servants. I even had one patient the other day to ask me to "scratch her right butt cheek!!!!" Was anything wrong with her arms? Noooooo. Had one to tell me that she had been instructed to report me if she had to wait more than 10 minutes for her pain meds (which I could understand if she were my only patient). Do you hear and feel my sarcasm?

Yep! Or what about the one who calls out, "NURSE!!! Help Me!!!!". When you nearly break your neck running into the room, she says sweetly, "Can you change the channel for me?" Oh, you mean change the channel on the TV that is on the swing arm and the darn thing is five inches from your face? That TV? :banghead:

Ayvah, RN · Mar 8, 2009

^^ well although the tag line of this board is nurses helping nurses i would say that this board is about 90% unhappy nurse, nursing student, etc. you have to spend a lot of hours troweling through this board to find people who are happy with what they do, so i see no evidence where people were prevented from venting. i also don't see how internet handles representing people you can't see could make you feel guilty about how you feel. your feelings are your feelings and you don't have to apologize for them. i'm of the opinion that no one should be miserable about their work. but if the guilt factor is there it is probably within - not something any of us have the power to make you feel.
just remember before you post: be supportive if at all possible
and likewise you guys should be supportive of the newbies and all the people who come by because they're pre-nursing, etc. some of us are old enough to analyze and extrapolate from what we read here but imagine if you were a teenager logging in here to research a career in nursing - this could be scary. for example op says mcdonalds is looking better and better every day. okay so she's upset and when people are upset they may say things they don't mean. but seriously - working for 1/4th or less the wage of what she's making now with no benefits and no job security looks preferable to being a licensed and experienced professional?? maybe this statement is qualified by the fact that she has a rich so and doesn't need the money - but most women in today's world have bills to pay and children to feed and shelter so objectively speaking working at mcdonalds cannot be better than nursing. just my 2.5 cents. as i said - no one should be miserable in their work, so i hope you find something where you are happier. at least you should be able to use your nursing license to do that.

hospital nurses are asked to care for a large load of very sick people, safely. it is near impossible what they ask of us to do sometimes. many of us feel guilty that we can't meet the impossible demands; we are upset because we can't practice nursing the way we want to, because it has immediate, visible, negative effects on the patient. we are angry and upset at the system that we can't give the patients better, and we have patients, families, management and docs who don't understand, already asking/demanding us to do more/faster. multiple people give up their lunch breaks already, some even giving up bathroom breaks because of the guilt. we don't need another straw to break the camel's back on that one. it is sad that we need to support each other to go eat once in a 12-16 hour shift. (see https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-discussion/no-lunch-no-372337.html)

this is not a 1 day a year vent, there are serious problems in hospital nursing which affect the lives of our patients, and negatively affect the health of the remaining nurses. i absolutely mean everything i have written here, even when i am not upset. that is demeaning to say that we don't mean what we are saying right now due to being upset. saying that i took care of 8 patients the other day, including one that would probably be going to the icu (per the doc) is a fact, not venting because i'm mad. the icu has a 1:2 ratio. please tell me how i am supposed to care for him along with all my other patients, who had problems themselves, safely? the doc and the charge knew what was going on. all i could do was hope and pray he didn't die on me while i ran around like a chicken with my head cut off. in none of my other jobs outside of hospital nursing have i cried at work, and seen multiple others cry, and spoke with multiple others who have had to go on antidepressant or antianxiety medication (and this is at 2 different hospitals). these are facts, not making stuff up because we are upset. money is not everything when it comes to work. no, of course working at mcdonalds is not ideal, but it is the fact is that she is thinking about non-nursing being a better working environment than nursing itself.

from what i've observed over 4 years on this board, there is a lot of support for nursing students here. there is also a special nursing student section on this board.

there are 4 nurses i work with who have told me that they feel trapped because they are the breadwinner in their house, their spouse is laid off, and they need the job to keep their house. they are miserable but they keep working through it. jobs have drastically dried up because places are using the recession cover to have hiring freezes. any teenager looking at nursing needs to face the reality of it instead of thinking its a fairy tale job. no, our voices must not be restrained.

Midwest4me · Mar 8, 2009

wow! your job sounds just like my job! do we work at the same place, on the same floor? i, too, work on a horrible med-surg floor and am currently looking for something less stressful. i started to transfer to another floor, then realized that part of the problem is the hospital. no matter where i transfer within the hospital, i believe that it will be similar because administration just does not care!
we cry at work, we have highly acute patients with high nurse:patient ratios, fight with pharmacy and doctors. i swear....if we could just be nurses vs having to fight with everyone just to perform our job duties, it would be nice.
i have a feeling that this is going to be normal practice for hospitals from here on out. sad, but true. it has been echoed here on an before. hospitals are being run as if they were 5-star hotels. we no longer have "patients"; we have "customers". and customers do not like to listen to patient teaching, or listen to nurses or doctors. they want what they want when they want it! now! how dare you try to keep them on the floor, much less in their room. they have rights, don't you know?
i am sorry i am venting, but i am right there with you. i am very disappointed that nursing has turned into such a circus!
i have a feeling that i am going to get flamed!

well i am certainly not going to flame you. i so agree; patients are customers and if we don't do what they want when they want and how they want, we are made to feel (by patient and management) that it's neglect. in our mental hospital, we not only have to deal with unreal accusations from patients but unreal accusations from staff who are retaliating against certain staff members. to protect ourselves lately from the slanderous/ridiculous accusations, we've decided and implemented our own little policy of making 2-3 staff members go in to care for a patient. think this is extreme? it's necessity!

SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN · Mar 8, 2009

Heh. I was just feeling sorry for myself because I don't work with patients any longer and don't feel much like a nurse.

I'm over it.

Midwest4me · Mar 8, 2009

heh. i was just feeling sorry for myself because i don't work with patients any longer and don't feel much like a nurse.
i'm over it.

hahahah:yeah: thanks for the laugh; i needed that!

Virgo_RN, BSN, RN · Mar 8, 2009

What's ironic is that around here, you need at least a couple of years of clinical experience as an RN to get a non-clinical nursing job, and they tend to pay less.

tinderbox · Mar 8, 2009

I'm getting out asap. I'm hoping to get into a grad program for library science, become a librarian, and get out of this profession, hopefully, within the next 2 years. I do not want to be one of those 60 yo nurses (no offense to those wonderful older RNs working the front lines) with weird aches and pains.

SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN · Mar 8, 2009

What's ironic is that around here, you need at least a couple of years of clinical experience as an RN to get a non-clinical nursing job, and they tend to pay less.

They pay more around here. Of course, when you remove the differentials it changes things a bit but again, around here, not much.

I got my job in informatics while an LPN at more than the hourly for a new grad RN and close to the hourly for the ADON in the SNF. I earn $3.50 an hour less - with her evening diff - than our PM RN.

And I still can't start an IV.

Nursing is bizarre.

emmalou* · Mar 8, 2009

I think if I had the opportunity of this website when I was a student I would have been grateful. People need honest experiences and advice before they embark on a profession IMO, and some of these comments may be the wake up call people need to focus on a specialty in nursing they really want to do, not coast along for a few years doing something they hate, but not knowing how to change it (like me!).

And the comments re: Maccas and The Gap made me smile. For years I used to envy people working in the Body Shop or Lush as I thought how stress free and fun it looked. Still do sometimes!

rentalnurse, RN · Mar 8, 2009

I think the same thing happens everywhere and pharmacy is understaffed as the rest of us. worked at sister hospitals back in Balt and they went computerized and all our meds were on the computer, docs could remotely put meds in and we would never know. when meds were due we had an hr before and after and if it wasnt signed off we got automatic med error, no matter if we put in 'med not up from pharm'

a couple of weeks ago i got floated with 2 staff nurses to med surg. none of us had access to the sure med machine to get meds out on that floor and since it was a weekend pharmacy left early. one of the nurses got called to go to another floor so we had to shuffle assignments. us 2 floats got written up because of late meds and and a pt who was later found out to be psch didnt like the one nurses 'attitude'. we are now banned from that floor. and because of the greivences filed against us they go into our files. I am working on a reply but that will do little.

Bugaloo · Mar 8, 2009

Hospital nurses are asked to care for a large load of very sick people, safely. It is near impossible what they ask of us to do sometimes. Many of us feel guilty that we can't meet the impossible demands; we are upset because we can't practice nursing the way we want to, because it has immediate, visible, negative effects on the patient. We are angry and upset at the system that we can't give the patients better, and we have patients, families, management and docs who don't understand, already asking/demanding us to do more/faster. Multiple people give up their lunch breaks already, some even giving up bathroom breaks because of the guilt. We don't need another straw to break the camel's back on that one. It is sad that we need to support each other to go eat once in a 12-16 hour shift. (see https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-discussion/no-lunch-no-372337.html)
This is not a 1 day a year vent, there are serious problems in hospital nursing which affect the lives of our patients, and negatively affect the health of the remaining nurses. I absolutely mean everything I have written here, even when I am not upset. That is demeaning to say that we don't mean what we are saying right now due to being upset. Saying that I took care of 8 patients the other day, including one that would probably be going to the ICU (per the doc) is a fact, not venting because I'm mad. The ICU has a 1:2 ratio. Please tell me how I am supposed to care for him along with all my other patients, who had problems themselves, safely? The doc and the charge knew what was going on. All I could do was hope and pray he didn't die on me while I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off. In none of my other jobs outside of hospital nursing have I cried at work, and seen multiple others cry, and spoke with multiple others who have had to go on antidepressant or antianxiety medication (and this is at 2 different hospitals). These are facts, not making stuff up because we are upset. Money is not everything when it comes to work. No, of course working at McDonalds is not ideal, but it is the fact is that she is thinking about non-nursing being a better working environment than nursing itself.
From what I've observed over 4 years on this board, there is a lot of support for nursing students here. There is also a special nursing student section on this board.
There are 4 nurses I work with who have told me that they feel trapped because they are the breadwinner in their house, their spouse is laid off, and they need the job to keep their house. They are miserable but they keep working through it. Jobs have drastically dried up because places are using the recession cover to have hiring freezes. Any teenager looking at nursing needs to face the reality of it instead of thinking its a fairy tale job. No, our voices must not be restrained.

Ayvah, Thanks so much for your input. I could not have said it any better. I also have seen great support for the pre and current nursing students on the forum. I have also seen some of the afore mentioned members get upset when we talk negatively about nursing.

It would not be fair for us to sugar-coat how things are for nurses right now, especially in the hospitals. If we allowed them to view nursing through rose-colored glasses, they would then be upset because we did not tell them how tough it might be on them!

When I discuss the problems in nursing on this forum, I am speaking for 95% of the nurses that I work with. If they could choose to leave nursing today, they would do it in a :redbeathe and so would I.

I have said it before and I will say it again: Hospital nursing, especially Med-Surg nursing is going down the tubes. Nurses are overworked, stressed out and mad! When they are able to say, "We are not going to take this anymore", hospitals will be in trouble.

There is absolutely NO WAY that you can adequately care for your patients given the high ratios, higher patient acuity, unsupportive administration, etc...

I, for one, am angry that the career that I worked so hard for and wanted with all my heart has turned into this. I no longer feel guilty for wanting to get out of nursing. I cannot call what I do "nursing". I am a patient representative who works on a floor with sick people. I have a license that allows me to throws some pills at them, start IV's, and write useless care plans that no one has time to update. Every now and then, I get a note on my locker telling me that I failed to do X amount of things during my so-called 12-hr shift, but if I had done the X amount of things they say I did not do, I would have been at work around 15 hours, went home and slept a few hours and then returned again for more of the same. It is a truly vicious cycle.