was i unprofessional? (quick story)

Nurses Professionalism

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I several years experience as charge nurse and I think I always handle people and situations quite well. However, at my current place of my employment, the first person who shows up for the shift is the charge nurse. Quite fine by me, but I've noticed a couple women who love the power trip of being charge and the other day it finally got to me. I show up for work and noticed that me and another nurse only had 8 patients assigned to us, whereas, the charge nurse assigned herself 11. I also noticed that we had 5 open beds. I voiced my concerns because it was clear to me (as always) that the other nurse and I were going to get the 5 admissions and the charge nurse won't have any, because she was already at her max. She disregarded my concerns and the shift began. Yep. right away, the other nurse and I each got 2 admissions. And then ED called to give us the 5th patient. This is where I put my foot down. I told, yes, TOLD the CN that she would be taking the 5th admission. She said NO, because that would give her 12 patients. I told her she can give me report on one of her current patients as I will take over their care. She huffed and puffed and pouted, but ended up taking it.

So by the end of the shift, I ended up with 11 patient (2 admissions and her spillover patient); the other nurse got 2 admissions = 10 patients....and the charge nurse had to give up a patient to take an admission, for a total of 1 admit and 11 patients.

Was this professional of me to grab the bull by the horns like this? I was very matter-of-fact, yet, professional......if that makes any sense. I wasn't ****** about it. I told my boyfriend about it and he thinks I was unprofessional....

If she has no additional duties, she is just trying to avoid taking admissions.

Like two nurses sharing a hall, one takes 7 and gives the other 5, at first glance looks like a good deal until you realize one nurse gets no admission and one gets two.

Specializes in Critical Care.

why on earth do you have that many patients?

all nurses?

hah

patients, students, pre students, cnas, among others, and now carpenters

Specializes in ED/ICU/TELEMETRY/LTC.

Not only were you unprofessional, you were insubordinate. You refuse an assignment you can be fired. "Charge nurse" means "in charge", and you should expect no more respect than you give.

The OP has explained that at this workplace "charge nurse" is not really a charge nurse.

I have worked in places that had this type of charge. It just meant that if something out of the ordinary went down, that person would would be the first one to try to fix it. Teams were split evenly and all experienced nurses took their turn at it.

The other type of charge nurse (the one who helps room pts, starts admits, facilitates discharges, puts out fires, coordinates with other departments, etc..,) of course would not have the same number of patients if any at all.

I find it rather unusual (to put it politely) that you feel a need to critique posts (punctuation, etc.) and answer questions on a nursing forum.

Is it because your wife is a nurse? Is it because you feel that as a carpenter, you can add to the nursing conversation? Is it because there are no carpentry forums?

It's just odd....:confused:

Being a professional in terms of interaction with fellow employees is not limited to nursing. Carpenters do it, too, and perhaps better as a group than nurses.

I came to nursing after a couple decades in another industry, in worker and administrative jobs.

Interpersonal skills are not dependent on the job one does.

The carpenter was not presuming to comment about clinical matters, but about the topic of the thread: whether the OP acted unprofessionally.

I don't see the harm in listening to, and perhaps learning from, others who have similar personal interactions in their workplaces.

Specializes in Med/Surg, Ortho, ASC.
Being a professional in terms of interaction with fellow employees is not limited to nursing. Carpenters do it, too, and perhaps better as a group than nurses.

I came to nursing after a couple decades in another industry, in worker and administrative jobs.

Interpersonal skills are not dependent on the job one does.

The carpenter was not presuming to comment about clinical matters, but about the topic of the thread: whether the OP acted unprofessionally.

I don't see the harm in listening to, and perhaps learning from, others who have similar personal interactions in their workplaces.

Of course professionalism is not limited to nursing. However, you will find that most nurses here (in my experience) are hoping to relate to/vent to/ask advice of those who actually know whereof they speak. For instance, would you return to your other industry positions in order to ask nursing questions of your former co-workers? I would think that you, with your multi-career background, would understand more than anyone that nursing is a unique profession with extremely unique working conditions and situations. I would no more ask a carpenter his/her opinion on nurse/patient ratios than I would ask a lifelong bachelor for parenting advice.

"The carpenter was not presuming to comment about clinical matters, but about the topic of the thread: whether the OP acted unprofessionally."

Interesting....how does one guage "professionalism" when one is clueless about the profession, except perhaps by virtue of being married someone in the profession?

I also found it extraordinary that the carpenter responder in question didn't hesitate in more than one response to correct spelling & punctuation, all the while that his posts contained spelling & punctuation errors.

Specializes in LTC, Acute care.

I'm still trying to comprehend the 11 patient ratio on a med-surg floor, I would surely drown. Dang!

Specializes in Med/Surg, Ortho, ASC.

OP, we've digressed and I apologize for my part in that.

I think you were right to call the "charge" nurse on her assignments. Given all of the circumstances that you list (charge nurse in name only, you perform the function yourself and know how it's supposed to work), it seems apparent to me that she was trying to give herself an easy night. We all (well, perhaps those of us in the medical field) have known nurses who will rig the assignments in order to spare themselves.

I don't think you were unprofessional and I hope that she doesn't try to pull the same trick on anyone else.

Not only were you unprofessional, you were insubordinate. You refuse an assignment you can be fired. "Charge nurse" means "in charge", and you should expect no more respect than you give.

LOL. I refused to receive yet another admission because it was too much for me and the other nurse. Afterall, we couldn't give the care and attention the next admission deserved. Telling the "charge nurse" who has 6 months of experience that she will take that admission was not unprofessional on my part now that I think of it. Thanks to me, that patient got a little TLC upon unit arrival. If it weren't for me grabbing the bull by the horns, the patient would have been neglected for probably a good hour whilst I tried to catch up on my other 2 admits and other patient needs. Good on me.

Specializes in ICU/CCU, Med Surg.

Whether or not you acted in a professional manner is a moot point here. An 11:1 ratio? Jeez, I'd be a blithering, disorganized, crying mess for 12 hrs, forget about having the presence of mind to be "professional". I work MS/tele and when I get 5 pts I'm running my a$$ off.

Charge nurse after 6 months? What in the world...where do you work, just so I can avoid that location like the plague.

The fact that you "grabb[ed] the bull by the horns" and gave a pt some TLC is truly astounding...and a little frightening, to be honest. With 11:1, makes me wonder what is falling by the wayside.

Specializes in Med/Surg, Neuro, ICU, travel RN, Psych.

I've worked some places that I thought was unsafe staffing, but holy cow.. that is ridiculous having an 11:1 ratio. That blows my mind.

As far as the way your unit is run, and "charge nurse" duties on your floor, it sounds like someone needed to step up and call her on it, if this is something she does on a regular basis.

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