Home Care Weekend Coverage

[PattiRN]

I was wondering how does your agency cover weekend care? Especially, do your nurses take on call? At present we have one nurse who takes all calls except HHA changes and call ins. I work for a county agency and we also have to answer Prevent calls regarding rabies or west nile virus. The nurse takes on call for 1 week and may take it Q6wk. All nurses who have worked less than 5 years take call and the nurses who have worked longer can opt out. Currently we are in negoiations with management to make changes.

[hoolahan, ASN, RN]

It's complicated.

FT'ers/Union nurses...depends on when you started working there. Some only have to do one weekend a month, some, who became employed more recently, have to work q other. FT nurses are the first ones taken off the schedule , in order of seniority, if it's not busy. If you want to take the day off, you are "reduced" which means you work your day off during the week.

PT'ers/Union nurses, are the next ones to be reduced.

Per diems would be the last to be reduced. Seems illogical, as most places gave the per diems off first in hospitals, but they want to sort of force the FT people to work during the week for better weekday coverage.

On-call...we have people who take regular call, so we don't have on-call, except in a few select situations...like if the sup isn't sure you will be reduced, you have to stay on-call until 10am. But, I think there have been a lot of c/o about that, b/c they told us they would let people know by 7pm the eve before for the summer.

[KP RN]

I'm with a large, hospital based agency.

We take call one night every fourteen days. Visits are paid out at a rate of visit and a half, and mileage paid to and from your home.

We do every third weekend, but generally, no more than 5-6 visits each weekend day. We do get a day off during the week before and after.

I should also state that one of the administrative nurses gets all calls before they come to me. I am only notified if visits actually need to be made.

Call offs, and problems with rabies/West Nile virus would not come to me!!

This is a new agency for me, and I feel like I'm being totally spoiled and pampered!!! I love it!!