Are these grounds for termination legitimate

iRN86 · Nov 15, 2009

jrhillborough, thank you for this post! i felt like someone wrote exactly what I felt like inside.

liebling5, MSN, RN · Nov 15, 2009

I was a nurse manager at a long term care facility who has a policy about no more than 9 unexcused absences within 12 months, and not more than 3 in the first 90 days.

Your grandmother's death should have fallen under "bereavement" and not counted against the "unexcused" number. And, since you WERE SENT HOME BY THE FACILITY with the shingles, then that should not count against you, either. As far as the time write-in, having a time-stamping clock device could solve alleged discrepancies and illegible handwriting.

Giving a medication past the one-hour window: not good, either. It counts as a med error, regardless of the other circumstances (2 admissions, etc). Was there a house sup, other nurse, manager or someone else who could have given the med? Remember, you can usually ask one of your team members for help when you are in a crunch. Paperwork can definitely wait. If the med was not available (not delivered yet, not in e-kit), call pharmacy or notify the charge nurse that the med is not there and document that, who you talked to, what time, and so on.

If I was your manager, I probably would have had a session with you, had some verbal counseling, and developed a corrective action plan. The Corrective Action process is covered by facility policy.

So, in your case, you would have had 7 absences within 9 months, one med error, and one alleged "falsification" of records. All of these combined could reasonably be considered legitimate grounds for separation. You were already on some sort of Corrective Action, so anything else you did could have been the "last straw."

This is not a criticism. I am presenting this from a manager's point of view. :twocents: :redpinkhe

liebling5, MSN, RN · Nov 15, 2009

Oh, yes, the resume question. You list the facility name, start and end dates, your title and your duties. If someone asks you the reason you left, you could say "personal" or something generic like "that experience was not a good match for me." Employers can only verify start/end dates and your title. Most are prohibited by law from saying anything else, including eligibility for rehire.

Since you are still relatively a new grad, be open to starting your "new grad" orientation again at another facility. I hope this helps you.

Peace.

Vito Andolini · Nov 15, 2009

Get a lawyer and sue them for whatever you can. They sound like they don't appreciate you at all. They sound like evil, idiotic jerks.

Of course, I have only heard your side of this - have there been other problems? Not trying to stir a hornet's nest, just wondering why they are picking on you? I doubt they fire everyone who has absences.

Let them know you are not a doormat and don't appreciate being thrown away like garbage for such ridiculous reasons.

Vito Andolini · Nov 15, 2009

I realize that this was a petty problem from an inexperienced nurse and as a result I really appreciate all of the comments you, the posters took the time to express. They were not very critical, but some were mildly critical or at least honest about the realities of the work place, some were supportive by sharing, some were loaded with wisdom as to how to respond, and some reminded me of what is important for a person to stay their best, don't mope, be happy. Each post contained advice that for me was invaluable and very helpful and I really appreciate each and every one of you. This is a wonderful site for a newbie to belong who is interested in learning how to become a very competent, professional nurse. I have a BSN, and a license, but I have so much yet to learn about life, nursing, and the work environment. For a young new nurse auch as myself, the combined wisdom of all of you members represent a treasure trove of wisdom available simply by asking.
I have decided to own my on version of "how to move forward" by ignoring the advice of the resume writers, and plan on beinbg honest about this situation. Yes, I was terminated because I was on probation for excessive unexcused absences. We are allowed three. However, one of mine was when I had the shingles and was sent home by the facility. Another one was when my grandmother died and I went to her funeral. The third one was indeed simply unexcused. I also was alleged to have falsified company records, and I dispute that fact. They claim that I actually arrived at work at 2:49 but that I signed in at 2:40. They claim they had a witness but I was never told who or how they documented this. I had no prior incidents with this, and I signed in due to the facility not having properly working equipment. I signed in according to my watch, and had no intention of cheating the facility. If I made an error, it was a simple mistake. At that particular facility, if I worked there again, I would require a witness to witness my entry. They also allege I failed to give a patient an ultram for an hour after a verbal order from a NP for a patient who had not been admitted yet. I did give the medicine after the chart was prepared, but since I had other duties I had to begin to stay on schedule, I did not give the medicine the minute the chart was available, but I did as soon as I could. I feel like I needed to have developed a better relationshio with my immediate supervisor, I realize that was my responsibility, and I plan on correcting that in the future. Despite that fact, I really enjoyed working at the facility and think overall they provide great care and the employees are all great as well. That includes my immediate supervisor. She was a great nurse and person despite not caring for me. Liking me is not a life requirement for being a good person. So I realize that I don't have perfect references, I don't have a lot of experience, I need to work on my interpersonal skills as well, but I am eager to learn, hard working, and I think pretty dependable. And I really need a job! I missed one day in 9 months. I could not not go to my grandmothers funeral. There was not a choice for me to make.
I am sure that 10 or twenty years from now I will meet someone like me and and want to pull my hair out over their unexperience, and naivety, but hopefully, I will remember these early days of mine. Then hopefully I will take a deep breath, smile, and not run her off because I can and because she is honestly more work than I would like at that point in my life. Instead I hope I help her become a competent, professional nurse. Nurses are educated at school, but they are trained and developed at the workplace by wonderful people like all of you:)

Just a reaction to having to go to Gram's funeral - while I certainly understand the sentiment, it was not totally essential to go. I have had relatives, close ones, pass while I was working out of state and it would have been way too costly to go to their funerals. I could not spend the money or risk losing my job. I had a family to support. If someone disagreed with my decision, they could have offered to pay my airfare.

I hated that I had to choose between being there to mourn and to support my family in their mourning and keeping a job/staying within budget. Being absent made me very sad, very angry, very everything negative. A hardness, a bitterness came into my personality for a while, until I realized how many other people have also had to miss many events - weddings, funerals, graduations, christenings, baptisms, bar mitzvahs, award ceremonies, their childrens' concerts and sports gamrs, on and on - because they had to work. It was somewhat easier to bear knowing that I was not the only one who ever missed an event.

It made me really stop and think about life and why some seem to always be in 1st class and others in tourist.

It made me hate being poor and it made me hate those rich, evil, conscienceless rip-off artists and con men/women who make so much more than I do - financiers, insurance people, college presidents, and many, many others who can say, "I won't be in. I'll be at my grandma's funeral today." But, even they have to perform and have good relationships at work or else. Life is hard sometimes, very lonely and painful.

But attending the funeral was not totally unavoidable and if your job was on the line, well, you probably should have skipped it. I know my view here will be totally unpopular.

erroridiot · Nov 15, 2009

Most employers of nurses (and other workers) are looking to save every penny they can. I have seen people fired so the employer could hire someone at $0.15 less per hour.

The employer you are speaking of is petty, dysfunctional and has no conscience (sociopath).

I hope that you will find a better employer in the future.

jrhillsboro · Nov 16, 2009

I appreciate the support, and I realize that a rehab hospital has to be run as a business, and make a profit in order to deliver a high quality of care. And I honestly believe my supervisor just did not like me, but that doesn't make her a horrible person. And it doesn't mean that I made no mistakes, I did make some errors. But she also made some errors like failing to insert a tube in a patient, even though she tried, causing him, a burn patient, to go without food, hydration, and medication for over 8 hours at least. Not intentionally. No one is perfect. In fact she taught me a valuable lesson I already knew but was not practicing. I should be a professional nurse at work, nothing more and nothing less. I should have never given anyone the power to hurt my feelings or to shame me, but I did. Concentrate on my job, perform it according to the proper protocol to the best of my ability, be a good team player, and then go home to "my personal life", friends, and world. There should be no personal involved in a professional role. There are certainly many opportunities awaiting me at great facilities. This facility was good, regarless of my situation. They have a great staff over all. Thanks for caring.

Scrubby · Nov 16, 2009

My advice-Get on a plane/boat whatever and move to Australia. Seriously. We don't fire people over stupid crap like this. In fact, it's incredibly hard to fire any nurse. I've never even heard of firing at will until I joined allnurses. Totally foreign concept to me.

chare · Nov 17, 2009

employers can only verify start/end dates and your title. most are prohibited by law from saying anything else, including eligibility for rehire.

although this is the only information that many employers will provide, this is by choice, not by statute in most, if not all states. especially if a potential employer has you sign a release of information on the reference request form they send to your previous employers.

i went to the lawyers.com employment law legal article for my current state of residence [color=#333333]north carolina, as well as [color=#333333]states california, florida,[color=#333333] georgia, illinois, michigan, new jersey, new york, ohio, pennsylvania, and texas; and each page contained the following paragraph discussing pre-employment references:

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a previous employer is free to provide any non-confidential information about a previous employee, so long as it's true and isn't provided to maliciously harm the employee. an employer who provides false information that disparages the employee may be liable for defamation. in order to avoid potential liability, many employers often refuse to comment on a past employee's job performance and confirm only dates of hire and separation, plus wage or salary information.

jrhillsboro · Nov 17, 2009

I understand that it is not "illegal" to give negative information to potential employers of employees terminated, but it does create the opportunity for liability and most employers have policies that restrict their employees from enagaging in the practice. However, in a small town it is easy for the supervisor to cast doubt and allegations against terminated employees thru the existing relationships. Most of the time the target is never even aware of it, except that they get no interviews, and then it is pretty obvious. I have no idea if mine will do this, and I suspect she is above this type of behavior. As I said , she didn't seem to like me but that is no litmus test. My best defense is to behave as a professional, be honest, even share the termination slip, admit I had some absences and explain the reason for them, be honest about my mistakes, admit that I have a lot to learn despite a fine education and quality experience, and wait until an employer who values honesty and character gives me an opportunity to prove I am an asset to their organization. I love nursing, am a hard worker, and I get more than I give from my patients when I do a good job, which is enough motivation to propel me on my way. No secrets, no baggage, and no reason to become bitter. Hopefully I won't be dis-illusioned by my candor:)

caliotter3 · Nov 17, 2009

although this is the only information that many employers will provide, this is by choice, not by statute in most, if not all states. especially if a potential employer has you sign a release of information on the reference request form they send to your previous employers.
i went to the lawyers.com employment law legal article for my current state of residence [color=#333333]north carolina, as well as [color=#333333]states california, florida,[color=#333333] georgia, illinois, michigan, new jersey, new york, ohio, pennsylvania, and texas; and each page contained the following paragraph discussing pre-employment references:
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the fact that an employer refuses to talk about an ex-employee's job performance can be taken as a negative referral in itself. if you were a good employee the employer would have no qualms about saying, "susie was a good worker. i was sorry to see her go. i would enjoy having her work for me again." if they don't say something like that, the prospective employer assumes something was wrong, not that the other is avoiding putting their foot in their mouth legality-wise. they all know that they can say anything and get away with it. my employment attorney made certain i understood this reality.

jrhillsboro · Nov 17, 2009

That is so true. Most terminated employees are either the victim of budgetary considerations or are the victims of interpersonal skills not being sharp enough to adjust in order to survive the workplace population. The few who need to be terminated are usually suffering from an addicition they cannot manage, are not mature enough and have the means, perceived or not, to want to work when they want, or are too immature. There are a few who are just plain sorry, or who simply don't have the stamina and or knowledge to function as a nurse. But 80% of the time the nurse is terminated simply because their supervisor decides they do not want them as a part of the team he or she is free to build. They accomplish this be zeroing in on the target, attempting to mimick the policies and procedures to build a case against the targeted individual. Then they begin a process of correcting the nurse for infractions, formally, that every nurse in the building violates, on a weekly basis. A facility is allowed a medication error rate of 5%. Medication errors such as failing to give an ultram 1 hour from the verbal order from a NP on a new patient would not be a significant error. The correct time for the clock to have begun was when the paper work was ready. The benefits of giving an ultram blind to the patients history and condition are far outweighed by the risks that have been identified by the FDA. In addition, to have done so violated the facility policies and procedures, according to one nurse the JACHO standards, and probably the Nurse Practice Act. Using the correct time for the clock to have begun, the time the chart was available, the gap was less than an hour. If the patient was in as extreme pain as the NP indicated, I think a review of the chart by a qualified physician would indicate that s stronger medication was needed if this medication error is justified or that the NP should have expedited the order. In addition, for a patient being transferred to a new facility, in anticipation of the admission process and the rigors of the physical transfer should have been given the medication immediately prior to the transfer. That is what created the apprehension and pain that the patient suffered from. If I could review the facility pharmacy consultant reports that identify each and every medication error and calculate the error rate, and review the corrective procedures executed against the nurse who committed the error, I would bet that they are not applied in a non discrimatory manner.

The staples I missed were treated the same way.. The first one I was working under my preceptor, so we both missed the staples. So did the 11-7 shift, and others. I was the only one disciplined. The second error was when I found staples that had been signed off that they had been reviewed but had not. That mistake was not discovered by several shifts of nurses, and was discovered by me. I removed the ones the patient showed me, and reported it. However, the patient had another wound that was not bothering her and I admittedly should have discovered them and removed them as well, but I didn't. But neither did the nurse on the next shift nor did the rn on the day shift. An LPN who had previously missed all of the staples not being removed found them and removed them, resulting in a write up to me. Were there any write ups of any other nurses, no according to my supervisor. She claimed that if the error is over 24 hours old you do not get written up if it is discovered. Hopefully I misunderstood her remark, but she did make it clear she was not going to write them up and it was her discretion whether or not to do so. And don't get me wrong, I am glad she did not write them up as they did not deserve to be, but neither did I. We are a team, and we expect each other to find and correct the mistakes we are going to make. That is why each shift is supposed to do a head to toe assessment each and every shift. But this type of error is made very often and is corrected as found without any formal discipline.

IN one of the write ups, they allege that the oxygen tube had not been connected to the wall by me. Well I did connect it upon the patients return from therapy. The tubes do not have a locking mechanism to connect the plastic to the tubing, and they pull off with simply a tug. There were many people in and out of the room including my supervisor and another nurse who were attempting, without success, to reinsert a feeding tube in a patient. How is a decision made that is was my fault, that I did not reconnect the tube?

Maybe I did not corectly attach the tube but how that would happen is over my head. But if errors count, were the two nurses who attrempted to reinsert the tube unsuccessfully written up for their mistake? What about all of the medications that were not given, the food and hydration missed for a severe burn patient, and why did they wait until the three to 11 shift to attempt to correct the problem. That could and should nave been corrected earlier. The result was much more significant medication omissions, harm to the patients physical condition resulting in being deprived of food and hydration, and was the family advised of the incident? Was the care plan adjusted to instruct the staff to offer shaved ice for comfort, possibly wrapped in a wash cloth? Were other measures considered? How important is the timely administration of an antibiotic and other medications for a severe burn patient? Yet, without proof, and with other possibilities as the culprit, I was written up for the tube not being connected. Was this an extremely rare event, no. So how may other nurses have been written up for this mistake if iti is automatically due to the nurse who connected the tubes error?

My absence due to a contagious dissease was not and should not be an absence. I was sent home and prevented from working. I lost money that I needed due to this event. I most likely was exposed to the infection at my workplace, yet workmans compensation does not cover that I was told. I had to buy my own medication and pay for my own doctor. I know that there are many infortunate people who could not afford to travel to their grandmother's funeral, much less to take off work to go. But there are also many types of relationships with grandmothers. My grandmother and I had a relationship beginning from birth and she was a regular in my life, contributed to my emotional, spiritual, and financial well being. She helped send me to school to become a nurse. She was a mentor to me, she corrected me when needed, she enjoyed me as a "girl friend", but mostly she loved every ounce of my being and for some reason was thrilled every single time she saw me, which was often, and I felt the same way. I would have gone to her funeral knowing I would have lost my job without even blinking, even if I had to walk the three hour drive. I cannot believe a facility that delivers not just physical care but is supoosed to deliver care from all disciplines would have me if I was any different. And yes, I did call in once when the reason was not absolutely required, in almost a years time. But other nurses missed worked during the same time and did they receive the same treatment? If I could look at the past years staffing schedule most facilities keep for one year that has the mark offs from call ins on them and review the appropriate employee files I would think they did not. That also does not reflect the accomodations afforded by the supervising nurse by request for time off`.

My point is not that I want anything done to my ex team mates. We all did the best we could, we all corrected the mistakes of others, and we did it without griping because we delivered quality care. True, some nurses are definitely superior to others in skills, some better at lifting the spirits of the patients, and boosting staff morale. But everyone makes mistakes. My termination was because my time badge was not working for a week, and I signed the log of the adjustment sheet after staying over until 2:30AM, was extremely tired, and did not get the time right according to an unidentified person by some undocumentable method. 9 minutes. First time offense. But in my supervisors mind the offense did not matter, that accomplished the last step to complete her execution of the policies and procedures to terminate me. It doesn't matter if I was treated the same, because I was not the same to her. I was a nurse she wanted to terminate and what she did matched the outline procedure as she interpreted it.

That is why I say that most nurses are terminated due to relationships. Nurses, good nurses, make mistakes daily, or well often. Most are not documented. But when someone decides she doesn't want to work with you and desires to eliminate your position or replace you with some she would rather have, they then implement the corrective procedures and execute the termination process. I did find it odd that they never advertised for my replacement.

Thats why I hold myself to blame for failing to have the relationship skills to have survived at this facility. And I did make some errors, admittedly. I am not perfect by any means, and I could have behaved differently in my dealings with my boss. But I was too naive to understand the dynamics of the work place. It was a good learning experience and I gained valuable experience at this facility because they did provide a high quality of care. I just need to learn a few things in order to grow as a nurse, and I now understand the need to at all times behave as a professional at all times at work. I can become a person when I am off duty:)