Are there any travel nurse jobs for Unvaccinated Nurses?

[Heart Attack Zack]

I have two years of ICU experience, and the past 18 months of that have been in a COVID-ICU. I had a severe allergic reaction to my first dose of moderna (major swelling of my face and tongue with extreme difficulty breathing. I rode via ambulance to the ER while breathing through an NPA). None of my doctors recommend me getting the second dose/booster. As much as I would like to be fully vaccinated, after being hospitalized and almost getting intubated from the first dose, it’s simply not worth the risk for me. I am healthy, young, and already had Covid before my first dose. Despite all of this, my hospital denied my medical exemption and fired me two weeks ago. This whole situation stinks, but I’m moving forward so....

I would like to start travel nursing, but I’m not sure if there are positions available for unvaccinated nurses. Any help is appreciated. Thank you.

[ShantelSharine, BSN, LPN, RN]

On 12/21/2021 at 1:01 PM, Tweety said:

Most of the hospital systems here in Tampa Bay don't require vaccinations.  This is Florida after all.  

Not sure when and if the Biden rules are going to take affect, so you'd better hurry.

We are currently done with the delta surge and covid hospitalizations are low, but there still might be a need for travel nurses, I don't know.

I'd check with the specific hospital system, I'm in Florida and the hospital system I am working for has mandated the vaccine 

[Rosharon21]

Try HCA. It's not mandatory.

[Jedrnurse, BSN, RN]

2 hours ago, Rosharon21 said:

Try HCA. It's not mandatory.

Except according to many, MANY posts HCA is truly the Employer from Hell.

[Guest219794]

16 hours ago, macawake said:

Hmm.. Like you I’ve never seen one used in a hospital for anaphylaxis but I can perhaps see it being an option in the field/pre-hospital if the swelling of the tongue and face from the angioedema is bad enough to make the mouth difficult to open/access. It can be done with the patient sitting up which might be helpful.  Hardly a long-term solution, but a temporary one. Unless the airway improves they’ll likely need an endo- (or naso-) tracheal intubation or a tracheotomy. 

Anybody goes into an ER with angioedema that bad is gets a tube.

If the tube won't pass, they get trached.

If the trach doesn't work, they get a coffin.

[macawake, MSN]

1 hour ago, hherrn said:

Anybody goes into an ER with angioedema that bad is gets a tube.

If the tube won't pass, they get trached.

If the trach doesn't work, they get a coffin.

I’m licensed to practice in two European countries and have been on exchange programs in two other countries and I have definitely seen a couple of patients come to an ER in an ambulance with a nasopharyngeal airway. It might not be common., but it’s a thing. I’ll take your word for the fact that could never, ever happen in the U.S.

[Guest219794]

1 minute ago, macawake said:

I’m licensed to practice in two European countries and have been on exchange programs in two other countries and I have definitely seen a couple of patients come to an ER in an ambulance with a nasopharyngeal airway. It might not be common., but it’s a thing. I’ll take your word for the fact that could never, ever happen in the U.S.

It happens quite a bit. 
Unresponsive patients with a floppy airway.  NPA, sometimes OPA.
I place them fairly often in the ER, and use them in a prehospital setting as well.
I have not seen them for the airway concerns generally associated with an allergic reaction.
I have never seen that.  Is that something you do where you work?

 

[macawake, MSN]

13 minutes ago, hherrn said:

I have not seen them for the airway concerns generally associated with an allergic reaction.
I have never seen that.  Is that something you do where you work?

My n is rather miniscule.. ? I’ve seen it exactly twice (in anaphylactic patients arriving to an ER). Both times in one of the countries I spent a couple of months on a type of exchange program. But no, not in my own country where we follow the same procedure as you described in an earlier post. Because I’d seen it done, I was just wondering if maybe it could actually have happened to OP. 

[HiddencatBSN, BSN]

21 hours ago, LibraSunCNM said:

How does this work?  You have a needle in your arm for an hour?  

Oh goodness, that would suck LOL.

No, they came to the peds ED in the morning when we were (in theory) slower. They got registered as patients and hooked up to full monitoring (cardiac, respiratory, pox, NIBP) and got 1/4 of the dose every 15 minutes and then were monitored after for a while and if needed we had the anaphylaxis treatment ready. I work evening/nights so most I did was triage and settle them in at the end of my shift but it was pretty successful. I didn’t hear of any excitement mostly just complaints that with our staffing and things picking up census-wise it was a pain in the butt for the day shift nurses, but I know we got a lot of high risk people fully vaccinated. They were all really grateful, friendly patients to settle in.

[HiddencatBSN, BSN]

And I just want to add, that people with genuine medical exemptions is why I feel it is so important for those who are medically able to be vaccinated to provide a larger vaccinated population for herd immunity. I totally appreciate the hesitation to get vaccinated if you’ve had a bad reaction. I work with a nurse who had hd Guillane Barre (sp?) from the flu shot. She did get the COVID vaccine but was closely monitored by her provider during the process and had a lot of anxiety around it. The folks who just don’t wanna…well. You can see my post history for my thoughts on that. 

With the staffing crisis it will be interesting to see if the CMS requirement changes. We didn’t lose a lot of staff over the mandate but between the staff we did lose to that plus the staff we’re losing to burnout or travel contracts and our patient volume….it’s a pretty bad situation here. Mandating to stay an extra 4 hours is a daily occurrence and that fixes things in the immediate moment but contributes to burnout and staff leaving so ultimately accelerates the crisis.

[LibraSunCNM, BSN, MSN, CNM]

48 minutes ago, HiddencatBSN said:

Oh goodness, that would suck LOL.

No, they came to the peds ED in the morning when we were (in theory) slower. They got registered as patients and hooked up to full monitoring (cardiac, respiratory, pox, NIBP) and got 1/4 of the dose every 15 minutes and then were monitored after for a while and if needed we had the anaphylaxis treatment ready. I work evening/nights so most I did was triage and settle them in at the end of my shift but it was pretty successful. I didn’t hear of any excitement mostly just complaints that with our staffing and things picking up census-wise it was a pain in the butt for the day shift nurses, but I know we got a lot of high risk people fully vaccinated. They were all really grateful, friendly patients to settle in.

Ah, gotcha.  So one dose split into 4 pokes.  Very cool!

[Angitia]

Yes! There are many states that don’t require covid vaccinations, many positions that will accept religious exemption no questions asked. Ask your recruiter. If one hospital doesn’t accept it, look for the next one.

[CommunityRNBSN, BSN, RN]

Travel nursing, I have no idea. I work outpatient in an FQHC that is always short staffed and hiring. We have been mandated to get vaccinated, but there is a procedure to apply and your case would likely qualify, assuming you have access to your records from the ED. They are definitely denying exemptions to the philosophical-objectors, but a true medical contraindication would be exempted, according to our CMO.