Terminated from LTC!

[Serenity USVI]

Interested in knowing how many of you have been terminated from LTC for speaking up for your rights and the rights of your residents?

I was recently terminated. I was an "at will employee." The reason given for my termination was I lacked 2.7 hours of PTO time when I called in sick, because I was up all night puking my guts out.

I truly believe I was terminated because I am very outspoken when it comes to working short. I am not only concerned for my Nursing license, but for the welfare of the resident's. I made this known to the Management on numerous occasions. Do you think they would come in and help when we are short Nurse's? Absolutely not!!! And I was told so by the DON and the ADON!

So, the end result. I was terminated. So, now my Nursing Colleagues are even working shorter than prior to my termination! Great Nursing Care!

Has this happened to any of you?

I do know that I would never have my elderly parent's ever enter this Facility. Not that we all do not try to give the best of care. But, it is an impossible task.

[sophie62401]

Did you ever say you'd call the state? That'll make them find a way to terminate you. I hope you HAVE called the state on them. When they don't listen to your legitimate complaints, you have the right and obligation to notify they next in line....and if you've gone through coroporate, then the state is next. (Unless the complaint is so serious that you just bypass corporate and go straight to the state). The surveyors will let your DON know who spoke with them (even if they don't do it outright, they do it). You can always call in the complaint anonymously. If it was res abuse, they would be there within about 3 days. If it's not an emergency, they'll take up to a month (Illinois).

[vloho]

I was terminated b/c I refused to take responsibility for 110 pt. then at another place I was told "well you know what you can do about it" when I worked in a total pt care place & had 8-10 pt.I allowed another nurse to take over sending out a pt that had screemed allnight in pain b/c she had fallen out of bed& 3 RN's [sorry] were to over worked during the night. Of course the day started out poorly any way .One nurse came up to the 7/3 supervisor saying "I found this pill ina pt's bed , She told the nurse the pt was mine and that I needed to make an IR. I had not even gotten re port yet. the pill was from night shift,and this nurse was an RN. Needless to say the RN left with out doing an IR . Sorry I'm just not impressed any more Being the extra pair of hands impresses me more than letters behind a name.

[Nurse4TI]

I am also an LPN in LTC. We are often overworked and underpaid. The facilities are finding it harder to keep staff, because they are often tired of always working short and quit. I am in a RN bridge program so now I just work for nursing agencies. I'm never in one place long enough to get frustrated with the lack of staff.

[teresa41]

Has your facility ever been cited by the state surveyors for understaffing? I don't know what state you are in, but here in Pennsylvania we are required to post the staffing and resident census daily. Have you ever considered contacting the department of health in your state and giving them a heads up on the staffing in this facility? I am a Director of Nursing in a small nurisng home and I work the floor as a staff nurse on MANY occasions to cover staffing shortages!

[CHATSDALE]

in louisiana they state surveyers never call ahead of time but you know that the time is getting short d/t when the last survey was conducted

this ltc is better than it once was due to the changing of corporation but it still has a lot of problems that could easily be addressed

nurses are terminated or they quit, go on maternity leave, etc and their is no aggressive effort made to replace them..

we are a small facility [130+/-] and we usually have two lpns on at night..if there is no second nurse the remaining nurse must take up the slack this is a dangerous situation...too many times more than one emergency will present it self . this can be a nightmare

from 6a to 10p there are 4 nurses, two to each side of the facility, if someone calls in or if there is simply no way to schedule someone then one nurse passes meds, does tx, etc for both carts..it is possible to do the meds but any observation of patients has to come from the aids, most are very good but some are new and some don't care

just recently we have been getting some help from agency but tptb are c/o cost...but few newspaper ads etc to fill positions...

overtime and bonus for working extra are fine but burnout is a fact of life

[gr8rnpjt, RN]

Nurses need to have legal representation to work in the current environment. As a nurse I currently have a prepaid legal membership that works in behalf of my legal needs. You can sign up too at http://www.prepaidlegal.com/hub/reyesarts

3 advertisments in 1 thread are a little much, don't you think?

[Balder_LPN, LPN]

3 advertisments in 1 thread are a little much, don't you think?

Yeah thats a horrible advertisement for the prepaid legal there. Where is siri or someone to remove this junk? I know I have had posts censored as ads for items that brought far more relevant info to the discussion than that.

not having this garbage is one of the things that make this site great. It is better to go a little overboard in censoring this stuff than to allow advertisements to sneak in as postings.

Look at reyesarts five postings, they are all ads.

[FrustratedLPN]

I was an "at will employee." Like I believe I stated earlier I have never ever been fired or the fancy terminolgy of todays' work world "terminated" from a job. I have had numerous jobs throughout my lifetime. It really has messed with my world.

Thank-you for asking. I don't believe I am going back into nursing. As much as I loved my geriatric patient's(although there were some that were very abusive) both physically and verbally, I am going to work in a woman's clothing store. Of course the pay will be considerably less, but at least there will no longer be the fear of being sued, due to the fact there is not enough staff to take care of all of these people, and management could care less. The state survey should tell management that we need more staff. We had people that fell, and they literally died due to the complications from their fall. This was more than a one time occurrence.

But, now the Facility that I was terminated from, which is supposedly non-profit just spent $600,000 on a very small parcel of land adjacent to this facility. In a recent newpaper article about this purchase it claims the money came from revenues generated by Medicaid and Medicare. Does anybody know if Government funded monies can generate revenues? Sounds fishy to me!

All, I have ever done in my nursing career is LTC other than some Home-Health Care Private Duty, which I truly loved. I am too old to put up with all of the Bull, and I can not even imagine working in a hospital setting after all these years! LTC was not like how it is now when I first started working as a nurse. I actually had some time to spend with my patient's and talk to them. Now, it is only after they die and I read their obituary do I know anything about them. Truly sad! I just give up!

All I know is that I do not want my elderly parent's to ever go into LTC, and hopefully by the time I am old, there has been numerous changes for the better. But, I cannot see that happening anytime soon!

And, if any of you other nurses who are in management or state inspector's could you please assist me in getting my hands on the State Survey resuslts, and the facilities plan of correction. Thank-you very much!

You sound like a mirror image of what I, along with my co-workers, are experiencing. If we speak out, we're considered "troublemakers". My employer is one of the largest long term care corporations in the U.S. and yet, we still remain short staffed (until they are aware State inspectors are due).

Nursing hours counted for the nurse managers, staffing coordinator, DON, ADON, RN managers, Admissions Nurse, MDS coordinator, etc. that NEVER have any patient contact. How long before someone, somewhere does something about this type of blatant misconduct? More money is budgeted for landscaping than for employees to staff the facility. Nursing Home administrators are not required to have a medical background, so they speak only from the "bottom line" and not from any knowledge if patient care.

If family members truly knew what went on behind the scenes they would be appalled. I HAVE to work, and I love nursing but being a patient advocate now means putting your job and career on the line.

More and more decubs.. more and more skin tears, incident reports, then the charge nurse gets reprimanded. As I told my supervisor, it shouldn't come as any surprise to any of management... how can 2 cna's take care of 60 plus patients and give them the proper care? Seems there is no such thing as "preventative medicine" in LTC.

The good cna's are becoming frustrated with the ones that are only using their job as a "stop gap" on their way through nursing school (my question is.. if you're not concerned about the patient's now, what difference will a nursing degree bring?). Job stress, burn-out are now an everyday occurence for nurses and cna's.

Management likes to preface every discussion with the term "budget constraints".. PLEASE!!! Budgets don't seem to matter when corporate luncheons are involved, or monthly bonuses are paid to department managers.

Whistleblower? I've been there done that on a previous job as occupational nurse when I discovered x-rays of employees hidden. Asbestosis related illness and deaths that were unreported to the employees. Even the woman that trained me on the job as occupational nurse, a non smoker, died within 6 months of leaving the position from lung cancer. I was terminated from this position when I questioned the medical recordkeeping. Now the facility is closed BUT.. I had no recourse, no job.. a single parent with no income.

Have we reached a point in our society where "integrity, conscience, caring, compassion, hard work" have given way to the almighty dollar? Nursing unions are not allowed in Tennessee, so that isn't an option. Family members wonder why we sometimes look so somber.. perhaps they need to know we just ran out of supplies and no way to get any.. we just found out we're having to work short staffed "again".. we just had another "memo" saying we now have additional responsibilities added to our already full schedule.

Healthcare reform is long past due, and I, for one am willing to stand up and be counted, let my voice be heard, but when I lay it all on the line for my patients.. I want it to have the most impact and reach the most people possible. It's time we ALL take responsibility for our actions.. ultimately we all answer to someone.

[vloho]

FrustratedLPN: You'er my hero. Boy did you say a mouth full. I dont see anything getting any better ,only worse. What will it really be like when we get there? Where do we go from here? Where shallI go What shall I do? Frankly my dear.......

[Nursepfv]

I'm sorry for you, but unfortunately this is not unusual. The management ends up getting rid of the best nurses. You know that all management is on a bonus structure after salary-if anything at all threatens this-they are people who often have no consciences about destroying people's lives to keep their bonus in tact.

There are also good people out there to work for, but it is a concerted effort to find them because I believe they are in the minority. I will say a prayer for you-sometimes a negative stimulous like this ends up pushing you in the right position. I was fired from a facility a few yrs. ago on false premises; they wanted to put a LPN in to do what I was doing at a cheaper rate (I have a BSN), also in an at-will state. The ironic thing is, even though it was very painful, I am now working in the corporate office of that same company in a position I absolutely love.

I would recommend writing out the entire story, sending it certified mail to your corp. HR, tell them you want it to be an official part of your file. After they fire you, they have the advatage of using anything you say against you by saying, "Oh, she's just a disgruntled ex-employee."

Why work for people like that and make them money? Find a better place.

[CapeCodMermaid, RN]

So....you've been fired. Fix up your resume' and post it on Monster.com. I did that last week and so far have gotten at least 30 emails and calls about job offers. We are NURSES!!! We are in demand for our knowledge, our skills, and our compassion. We do NOT need to work for crummy, uncaring corporations. We need to value ourselves and what we do in LTC. Not too many people will end up in an ICU, but most people will end up being old.