When are you going to get a "real" job?

Specialties Private Duty

Published

Hello again fellow PD nurses! Just here to let off a little steam I guess... I am so tired of family and friends asking me, "when are you going to get a "real" job at a hospital?" or "have you applied at so and so hospital yet?" Actually no I haven't applied at so and so hospital because I HAVE a job and I am NOT looking for a job. I am perfectly happy in my position as a private duty nurse, which is a specialty and takes excellent assessment skills to be able to be out in the field on your own without a "rapid response" team just a button away when something goes wrong! My patient's family put great trust in me to take care of their sick loved ones in their home. God forbid you should become disabled young or be diagnosed with a chronic debilitating disease, and want to live your life comfortably in your own home, maybe then you would appreciate that private duty nurse for not getting a "real job" and instead taking care of YOU at HOME! Ahhh I feel so much better!

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If you and your immediate family are happy, no one else gets a vote.

A creative rejoinder is to say that you hope other nurses don't find out how content you are with your job or they'll be wishing they had it. Then just walk away with a Mona Lisa smile. :)

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I discussed this once with my supervisor at the beginning of my nursing career. She had been an RN for way longer than 50 years. She told me that back then, when she started out, only sub par nurses who could not cut it in hospital environments, or who could not get hired into hospital environments because of their less than stellar nursing school records, went into home health. In other words, home health was the destination of those who weren't good enough for mainstay nursing. I don't doubt that her historical description of matters was accurate. And yes, I have been confronted with this negative attitude from home health clients who were quick to be condescending, but slow to give thanks for making their lives easier.

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Specializes in Home Health, PDN, LTC, subacute.

I get this from my family/friends too who are NOT in the nursing field. There are not a lot of LPN options around here and I'm not letting others dictate my job for me. :nurse:

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Ooh- I could have written your post! I get the same thing. Just yesterday I was catching up with an Aunt and she had the nerve to ask "Are you still taking care of your little patient?" Like I stop by and do volunteer work or something! I should have said-Oh you mean the one on the vent with a trachea and g tube and paralyzed from neck down??!! So invalidating!

Let it bounce right off you! My pt would be in a nursing home too if it were not for her team of nurses that assist her to remain in her home. She is a young person too.

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Specializes in LTC, Memory loss, PDN.

I love my job so the answer is when h..ll freezes over.

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Specializes in LTC, Memory loss, PDN.
I love my job so the answer is when h..ll freezes over.

Besides, if I got a real job, I'd have to learn how to spell - I meant h..l ;)

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Specializes in LTC, Pediatrics, Renal Med/Surg.

It is annoying. I do like home health and I appreciate that PSA is the first company to give me a chance, and ppl do look down on me coming right out of school and going to home health. To be honest the only reason I went to home health initially is because no one else would give me a chance. But I am enjoying it. Its just my coworkers at my nursing asst. job are like...aww thats so good for you, atleast you can utlize some of your nursing skills...blah blah blah and say it condescending like they think I'm not able to handle a hospital setting. Then after I told them I do Mon-Wed. with one patient for 8 hour shifts not visits, with no weekends etc. her tone and expression changed from one of fake congratulations to real....almost to the point of seeming jealous....yep my "little home health job" is starting to sound pretty good to you now doesn't it?

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Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.

There's no shortage of dumb stuff people can say! I rather like to think about it as needing to be more skilled because we are on our own out there and though most home care vent patients are stable it's still a ventilator! We don't have RT, rapid response, or another nurse to grab if things should go terribly wrong. After you do this for a while you may hear some true-life horror stories from other PD nurses. I've heard several accounts of nurses pouring water down the trachea that was supposed to go in the Cascade chamber or had collected someplace in the vent circuit, or going on an outing and forgetting to bring the suction machine, things like that. That's when you really get angry at the people who are dismissive of the importance of your job. Ignore.

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Specializes in Cardiac Nursing.

I'm not a HH or private duty nurse. But I thought it was a real job, your taking care of "real" patients right? Just in a different environment.

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Specializes in Not specified.

Let's face it the environments in which nurses are working have almost come full circle. In the early days of the professional RN, you went to nursing school, were a slave to a hospital until you graduated and then if you were lucky, you found wealthy family to become a private duty nurse.

Then no one could afford a private nurse so we went back to the hospitals, everything got high tech and patients got sicker and we got paid more.

Now physicians don't want to keep their patients in hospitals because longer stays correlate to pneumonia, sepsis and superbug infections. Besides, people don't want to stay in hospitals and prefer recovering in their homes.

Now the home health business and private duty business is taking off.

to the poster about getting a real job, do you think your family would complain if you were the private nurse of a Rockefeller or a Hilton or heir to a huge fortune? while you are making six figures utilizing high tech home health equip having autonomy and being able to chill in home environment, your fellownurses get yelled at by everyone, get overworked and underpaid and burn out in the hospitals. Ha!

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After the craziness of acute care, clinical care, and driving from patient to patient in home health, I happened upon private duty. It worked out just fine; I have been with this patient for a number of years. The pt was born with treacher collins and requires nursing care 24/7. Very often the work will take every bit of nursing skill I have to keep the sats above 90 on 12/L liquid O2, and to top it off, the family is disfunctional. At all times I remember that my first responsibility is to my patient and that I am a guest in the family's home.

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