Acute nurses covering multiple hospitals, what is the radius you must travel?

[drivesbarefoot]

I'm curious about acute nurses who are contracted to cover multiple hospitals. What is the farthest distance you could end up driving to go to work, and what is your call response time for the distant ones? Also, does you company pay you travel time and mileage when you have to go to a distant hospital? How many hospitals do you cover and how many nurses are on call each evening/weekend? Just wondering because we may have to start driving to another hospital which is an hour away. No one asked us if we were on board for that, they just assumed we would do it and now the contract is signed.

[Guttercat, ASN, RN]

The only assumption in this business move where you're concerned, is that either you

a.) already live within travel time, or

b.) you will move, or

c.) will accommodate it by any means necessary when you are on call, incl. but not limited to sleeping in your vehicle :)

For what it's worth, my (previously) hospital-owned acute program had a response time of around 45 minutes if I recall correctly. I live out a ways, but this was usually doable.

Find out what is laid out in your company's new hospital contract. Call to hit-the-door time should be clearly stated. If you reside outside this time frame, then my best to you. :)

As an aside, I think the for-profits (like the "Big Two") actually have a fairly reasonable call-to-door time. Whether they reimburse for travel time and mileage, I haven't a clue.

[NurseRies, BSN, RN]

11 hospitals, only get mileage if you go from one hospital to another. Hospitals are within a 45 mile radius from two furthest points. 1 hour call to door time, which is reasonable if I can be out the door in 15 minutes. I moved in the middle, but I think they kind of expect you not to live too far away, otherwise when you're on call, you may need to get a hotel room in the middle. Part of your job responsibilities are to be able to be to the hospital in a quick time frame. See if they can hire a new nurse or two who live closer to the new contract so that those nurses can work full time there and the rest of you will hopefully rarely have to travel there. They could have one nurse at distant location m,t,w and the other one tr,f,sa. What if the new hospital rarely has patients and so you only go there once a month? That's not too bad. It's a unique nursing job with a lot of travel, but travel is just a part of the job. Now if you get called in to the distant hospital that is an hour away, you should be able to clock in for travel time since you're on call. Ask about all that! Unfortunately, small community hospitals in BFE cannot provide their own services most of the time, it's just too unpredictable. Lots of acute programs are picking up these small contracts anymore! And yes, no one seems to like it, but like it or leave it. There aren't many options.