bad mgmt + bad decisions=burnout?

[sasha2lady]

i am just wondering....is there some unseen rule in ltc that says the don or other mgmt personnel can just let shifts run short? we were short aides, severely short, the don came in to "decorate" a room in the facility....didnt help the nurses with anything, nor the aides who are already burned out to the max from months of working short...when a nurse told her the aides were short and needed help she said "i cant make anybody stay over" ...yet....she has told me herself several times in the past that i had no choice but to stay over....even though im not an aide...ive had to stay over many many many times due to call ins for nurses on third before. ....i counted the call ins...the ones that are actually written down....for jan and feb combined there have been 93 call ins...all but 7 are aides, the remaining are nurses. yet, nothings been done..not one thing. can a don not mandate that people stay over at least to get the next shift halfway through? why cant she just say ok...i need 1 or 2 volunteers to stay for 3 more hours to get the next crew through...prns are a joke...we have them on paper but not in reality...both for aides and nurses. they rarely come in when needed, then if they are scheduled they call in. again, nothing done...yet those of us that are there all the time...and are reliable have to get all the brunt work put on us plus picking up slack. its not fair. its been brought up in many many meetings...and nothing has changed..going on 4 yrs now of this. mgmt needs to beef it up get some balls and clean house i think....if i had the title and authority to get rid of these slacker staff members, id do it all in one day....what gives????????? if it werent for the fact that the nurses like working with each other it would be guaranteed that nobody would ever stay there. thats why we've all stuck with it...for each other.

[calliesue]

noc4senuf,

I have to give you credit then. In most of my LTC experience if management is on my hall it is to do rounds,not answer lights.(unless state is in the building) Sad to say that only once can I recall a nurse manager actually helping on the floor and that was when staff was decimated with the flu. We were critically short and the flu was raging in our building.

Our adon came in to help, actually wiped buts and cleaned up puke. That was quite a morale booster. I had a new found respect for her after this incident.

[rnto?]

I am a supervisor and will say that myself and my ADON, DON DO help with toileting, etc. But I don't kid myself that it's the norm and I don't take offense with anything posted in this thread. We've all seen people that abuse thier authority and forget what it's like to be on the front lines. Honestly I don't know what to do about it-sure, it's easy to say that we need to stand up for ourselves as nurses but most of us aren't in nursing just for fun-we need a paycheck! and with the economy the way it is, I know I at least feel stuck in my current job. LTC facilities are feeling the pressure too-they are trying to cut costs with staffing!

[noc4senuf]

I did not get into nursing because it was fun, it was the only thing I ever wanted to do... and i have done other things for jobs along the way. I never wanted to be a hospital nurse and hated my clinicals back in school when they took us to the hospitals. I love going to work and knowing my residents and their families. No, it isn't an easy job for any of us but, i wouldn't trade it for anything that was not LTC.