some of my coworkers are spending way to much time on personal phone calls

[oramar]

Let us face it two or three calls a day from friends and family lasting 30 to 40 minutes is to much. I am not talking about the person who has an unusual family crisis and who suddenly finds themself on phone more than usual. I am talking about people whose entire lives seem to be in crisis 24 hours a day 7 days a week for years on end. These same individuals take 5 smoke breaks a day and disappear for half hour or 45 mins. each time you send them out to pick up blood or supplies. I hesitate about complaining to managment because I have seen this situations before. Managment totally overreacts and comes down really hard which causes a revolt among employees that don't abuse the situation. Sometimes a word to the wise is sufficient and I did get one person to alter this behavior to acceptable levels. Now I have about 5 other people I got to clue in without making an enemy or starting a war. I have decided taking them on one at a time and tayloring my approach to the individual is the best way to go. Why do I take this approach? Because I am not perfect and there have been times when someone approached me about a behavor in a very lighthearted way and I caught on quick.

[BGSUstudent]

I work as a tech under an RN on a team of pts. On a 3-11 shift I was doing rounds and 2 of my pts. were fresh post-ops. Both of these pts. were in pain and another one of the pts. was nauseaed. I went to find the RN to ask her to medicate these pts. I found her sitting in the break room having a personal conversion on the telephone. I approached her and relayed that 3 pts. needed medicated. She said ok and continued to have her unnessary personal conversion for about the next 20 minutes. There were 2 other RN's on the floor but they had about 10 pts. apiece themselves so I didn't want to ask them to do my RN's work. Aproaching the 20 minute mark our nursing supervisor came around the corner. I approached her and told her that the RN over me had continued to talk on the phone even though I had requested that she should medicate our pts. Tattling on someone isn't something that I normally do. I always try to resolve the situation on my own. Anyways the supervisor asked her to get off the phone and she did. The RN wouldn't speak to me for the rest of the evening. I didn't want to get her in trouble, I just wanted to be an advocate for my pts.

[JacelRN, BSN, RN]

We have a nurse on our floor who glues the phone to her face. I'm nearly serious. She even sits during lunch with the rest of us on a personal call. If its not her kids, its her boyfriend, or her ex-husband. Its something of a nuisance.

What I'd like to add is this is a nurse with MANY years experience. She is an example of an "OLDER generation" doing what many think "YOUNGER generations" do. This type of behavior is definitely not limited to any age bracket. Work ethic is learned not inherited with what decade you were born in.

My 2 cents,

JacelRN

[nursebedlam]

I work as a tech under an RN on a team of pts. On a 3-11 shift I was doing rounds and 2 of my pts. were fresh post-ops. Both of these pts. were in pain and another one of the pts. was nauseaed. I went to find the RN to ask her to medicate these pts. I found her sitting in the break room having a personal conversion on the telephone. I approached her and relayed that 3 pts. needed medicated. She said ok and continued to have her unnessary personal conversion for about the next 20 minutes. There were 2 other RN's on the floor but they had about 10 pts. apiece themselves so I didn't want to ask them to do my RN's work. Aproaching the 20 minute mark our nursing supervisor came around the corner. I approached her and told her that the RN over me had continued to talk on the phone even though I had requested that she should medicate our pts. Tattling on someone isn't something that I normally do. I always try to resolve the situation on my own. Anyways the supervisor asked her to get off the phone and she did. The RN wouldn't speak to me for the rest of the evening. I didn't want to get her in trouble, I just wanted to be an advocate for my pts.

Clap,, clap,, clap,, well done, l feel you did the right thing. :rotfl:

[oramar]

Eventually I will have to involve NM in the situation. Like I said, I have seen managment come down on the entire staff in several instances when what they need to do identify serious offenders and bring them to task. Take for instance, one of our secretaries has 13 year old twins who are home alone for a hour before her husband gets home from work. They usually call her on arriving home from school and she will check back one time, then her husband calls to say he is home and everything is OK. Each of these calls take 30 seconds and does not interupt the flow of work. This kind of stuff is fine with me and I would rather have her know her children are OK than see her ravaged by worry. However if managment starts to limit phone calls, people like her who use the phone but do not abuse the phone will be caused a great deal of unnecessary anquish.

[jemb]

I agree, oramar, that the momentary check-ins and such are reasonable. I, too would hate to see everyone lose the privilege of using the phone at all because of a few who abuse it.

One of my prior employers went through a phase of tracing numbers that were called repeatedly for 15 minutes at a time or more. If the number could not be found in a cross directory, somone would call it and ask who had been calling from the hospital. Those who could be identified were disciplined, and those who weren't caught became too paranoid to keep making the calls. It made a difference for awhile.

[stbernardclub]

:angryfire Oh yes,Its all coming back to me now. Especially on the med surg/onc floor where on a good day you got 8 patients on 3-11. How can people get away with the long phone calls? Well, evetially they don't.First these dumb idiots are the ones still sitting there for an hour (on obertimeof course) at the end of their shift catching up on their work. I used to be the first one out the door at 11:30. caught some resentment for always having my work done on time, and never sucked up the the o.t,because,I enjoyed being home on time.That hot bath felt great at 11:50, when those idiots were just getting to their notes. Not all people went into nursing for the right reasons, thats forsure!!

[mattsmom81]

:angryfire First these dumb idiots are the ones still sitting there for an hour (on obertimeof course) at the end of their shift catching up on their work.

Yeah those who routinely waste time then use an hour OT is a whole 'nuther thread. And it is tolerated. so many times... I also work with a nurse who is 30 min late...every day...and overtime 1 hr charting everyday. Also tolerated. Sure made me mad when I had to wait for her and my kids were late for school cuz of it.