Absence of Teamwork

[jkaee]

Ruby....your post made me nostalgic and sad. It was that kind of atmosphere that made me excited about nursing, when you could acutally be a nurse and not (as another poster so eloquently put it) "nurse the chart more than the patient." I loved hands on nursing, including bed baths and changes, as much as any other aspect. I would jump back to floor nursing in a heartbeat if it could be that way again.

[OgopogoLPN, LPN, RN]

I completely agree! And I don't even have any years of experience to compare to, just different floors/wards that I work on.

There is one place I completely REFUSE to work due to lack of teamwork and poor, poor communication. I've turned down two 12 hour OVERTIME (double pay) shifts to this place because of how horrible some of the staff are.

[pagandeva2000, LPN]

It breaks my heart to see how nursing has broken down. Sometimes, I suspect it is managed care, new insurance rules, remodeling the physical structure of the hospital, etc...

I watched my grandmother, who was a supervising RN of the OR work. The CNAs and nurses were a team. I remember when I used to work in psych and would bring my patients to the current hospital I now work in as a chaparone. My mother worked as a CNA in some of the same clinics I currently work at as an LPN. I remember meeting these nurses, and I noted that they ALL pitched in to help each other and the CNAs. I remember sitting and chaparoning psych patients on the med-surg unit and I saw the nurses who had MORE patients than now gather together with the CNAs for bedmaking and bathing. CNAs knew how to do simple dressings, would let the nurses know if the IV was running out. Some even knew how to change normal saline bags for the nurses. LPNs were not considered to be 'less than' as much. The team nursing model had more successful outcomes to me than this primary nurse model. And, I also noted that NO ONE went home physically or mentally tired, unless the day just went BANANAS!

Nursing staff had productive lives, then. Even the ones that work evenings and nights. No exhaustion to the point of neglect of their homes, families, etc... Now, with all of this charting ridiculous crap, computers timing how long it takes a poor nurse to care for patients, more cut throating,etc, the stress has hit it's all time high.

I remembered wanting to work in my hospital. I already knew everyone, because they watched me grow up. Now, only a few people that remember us are there, and sometimes, I feel that the minute I walked through the door was when I noted a decline in the morale of the nurses and patient care.

Nostalgic? Yes, I am. So, I do understand.

[PureLifeRN]

You wanna know why the "team" mentality stopped? Because when sh**t hit the fan, and the public started going crazy suing for medical malpractice, they couldn't sue "the team." The sue the RN. Logistically, I wouldn't want to be on the hook for 10-12 patients and depend on someone else to do their job (how many posts do we see about lazy co-workers??). I would rather take my 4-5 patients, have a tech that will sometimes do vitals and a bath, and go about my day. It's all about covering your butt.