Re: Not ready to be charge Originally Posted by Jen_the_RN2009 
We always assigned by acuity, so whomever had the higher load also had the lower acuity patients. I've also seen it where the charge had the same number as everyone, but took the lower acuity patients.
That is generally how we do it, however we have an odd number of beds on purpose so the charge gets 5, the rest 6 with the charge team being a little "lighter" so she can help at anytime with transfers, difficult patients etc in addition to the general team assignments etc.
In our current model however we are supposed to run 5 nurses at night with the charge out of staffing and without a team, but yeah...that never happens lol.
To the OP: In my perspective I assume you work in a hospital, with acuity as high as ours (we are pretty much step down acuity) therefore your situation seems impossible, and I wouldn't want to charge without the necessary support of techs either.
How is it that you run with no techs? What would you say is the average acuity of your floor? What types of patients are your most common?
For us we run primarily with exacerbated CHF, chest pains (on the light side) and then s/p whipples and other various GI surgeries (on the heavier side) with a smattering of detox and elderly hip fx's.
Tait
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