Burned out!!!!!!!!

Tait, MSN, RN · Jan 2, 2009

Nursing can definitely be a burn out profession...and damn fast at it too.

I found myself cruising the want ads looking for anything that didn't involve responsibility the other day. My confidence was in my toes, my head was a swim, and my heart just felt...heavy.

I took some time, actually called off on a Saturday night and just gave myself a little time to breathe. I realized that a lot of my burn out is related to trying to do too much on my shift. In addition to my normal patient duties and charting, I also chase call lights for anyone, silence pumps, stock med carts and on most nights put in my own orders since our secretary floats between two floors.

Sometimes I think when management cuts a few ancillary they don't realize how much those extra little tasks really add up.

I am considering writing an article about the life of a nurse, and how it seems that everyone else's job description is set in stone but ours.

When there is no secretary, who answers the call lights? Us

When there is no transportation who takes the pts to CT and picks up supplies? Us

When there is no one to call a doc as your co-workers patient circles the drain who calls? Us

I have learned to really appreciate the nights when I can talk to my patients, educate and tidy up charts.

:icon_hug:

Tait

kemper1974 · Jan 2, 2009

Emily, you must work at my hospital. We have a new nurse manager who is hell bent on writing everyone up for patient complaints. We no longer follow the policies, we must kiss up to the patients and make them happy at all costs.

There was a new slogan put forth by administration that hangs at the nurses desk, "when you are happy where you work, it shows". We all know it does not apply to us.

The problem besides patient entitlement seems to be the hospitals are losing control. When did policies not matter? Our nurses are given mixed messages...follow the policy or get written up, or follow the policy, and get written up for making a patient unhappy because you followed the rules.

While I understand the need for hospitals to attract paying patients, give them good care and maintain a relationship that attracts repeat customers, the hospitals need to remember that their second set of customers are the nurses and staff. I have never seen morale as low as it is now. We are not asking for anything other than to be backed up by our management as we follow the rules they set forth, and for safe staffing levels to provide the standard of care they wish to deliver. Our hospital is there to heal and help, it is not the health spa!

abundantjoy07, RN · Jan 2, 2009

Between having to fill out hourly rounding papers, open visiting hours and endless charting, I feel like my job is a cross between pushign papers and being an indentured servant to the patient's and their families. Anyone else feel like this?

Ya'll do hourly rounding papers too? Humm...I thought that was just an idea that was limited to where I work. We also have open visiting hours (hoo-ray). Endless charting... times infinity. *sighs heavily*

Virgo_RN, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2009

I find that it's cyclical for me. When I am burnt out, I just want to hit the elevator and not look back. Then things get better, and I feel a great sense of pride and satisfaction in what I do. Right now, I feel okay. Tonight I caught a mistake and rectified it before it could cause harm to the patient, and I made some family members comfortable enough with the care that their loved one was receiving that they finally went home! A doctor provided some unsolicited teaching to me in a noncondescending way, and I learned something new.

I'm sure next week, I'll be looking at those elevators and thinking "what if..".

emilee1978 · Jan 2, 2009

It just seems like even the patients have this attitude, if it's not the 300 pound ETOH'er demanding food, or the chronic COPD'er in your ICU for the 15th time c/o not being able to afford their meds-and yet continuing to smoke, it's management telling you that your attitude is "poor", how could it not be? I became a traveller hoping to bypass alot of the politics, but it doesnt' seem to matter.

NewEastCoastRN · Jan 2, 2009

I will keep this short and sweet because I am exhausted :) Yes, I am burned out for all of the reasons outlined above plus some, and that is why I am leaving the profession. Perhaps I am just not strong or selfless enough to put up with it, but to me it isn't worth being miserable for the rest of my professional life. I am counting down the days until I finish school...

mikesrn · Jan 2, 2009

to those that feel they are not strong enough or selfless,the opposite is true.To do what we do you are naturally strong and beyond selfless.The problem is indeed the public and the hospitals.I work in critical care,and yes the esrd diabetic (at age 23) addicted to opiates and stating "I will sue" if my pain isn't relieved makes me want out.Doctors saying "I have to drag myself out on a snowy night just to see one patient!!(Who is crashing and later coded!!)is draining.My husband wonders why on my days off( I work nights) I just sleep.I had an etoher's wife tell me at 8:00pm her husband was ready to retire for the evening.I said well,I will make him comfortable,but he needs medication and i must assess him(He had chf-on the fence to be tubed)she looked at me like I was crazy.(Not to mention he was incontinent of urine and required three bed changes)Administration waants to let the inmates run the asylum-i wonder what they will ever do when there are no nurses left??

Bugaloo · Jan 2, 2009

Lord have mercy! You are preachin' to the choir! The nursing field is full of burnt out nurses. We want to love what we do. We really, really do! And if everyone would just get out of the way and let us do our job, we probably would enjoy at least some parts of it.

Between non-compliant patients, demanding and unreasonable family members to rude physicians and clueless management, it is very hard to get done what needs to get done.

For some reason, it seems that over the last decade, patients have become convinced that managing their own care means being non-compliant, buying alcohol and cigarettes instead of their Lasix or insulin, and then calling their doctor an idiot who does not know what he is doing. These same people are the ones who, for some reason, also seem to have a great sense of entitlement.

I am not trying to sound rude or judgemental, I am just being honest. I work on a very busy med-surg floor. We get everything. If I have 8 patients, it is a pretty good chance that maybe 3 of these patients are really and truly sick, and need to be there. One will be there because they are there at least once a month with abdominal pain of unknown origin. IV pain meds every hour, ya know. One will be a psych patient who needs to be medically cleared. He or she is so mentally unstable that they require a 1:1 sitter at all times. One is still there because although her doctor discharged her two days ago, she refuses to go home and he won't make her. One is detoxing from ETOH or narcs and is being belligerent and rude to everyone he comes in contact with. And the last one is there because we are babysitting for her family who "just can't take care of mom anymore, but don't want to put her in a home yet".

I really don't remember it being in my job description to be screamed, hollered or cursed at (by someone who is in their right mind). Nor do I remember being spit on, slapped, or kicked being in that description. Patients have rights. It is given to them on a piece of paper when they are admitted. But nurses do not have rights (not that I am aware of, anyway).

So when people who are NOT nurses wonder what causes nursing burnout.....the above is just part of the problem. I could really write a book. But I won't.

alpha omega · Jan 2, 2009

I'm so sorry you had to go through that. But you're absolutely right--at some point in time we nurses stopped being professionals and started to become personal valets.

We had a situation at the LTC facility where I worked where an extremely demanding patient (to the point that patient care for other people was suffering) was telling his family members how cruel and abusive we were to him. In actual fact, we were bending over backward to be nice to this man. One of his favorite tricks was to request things like coffee or extra pillows, then curse you out and throw the object at you when you brought it to him in a timely manner.

Unfortunately, the family had no more sense than to believe HIM and complained to our DON. So she called us all into her office separately to discuss the problem. When I talked to her, she said the wife was threatening to come in some night unannounced to see what was going on. My response? I thought that was a WONDERFUL idea--then she could see how kindly we treated this man. I asked the DON to encourage her to come in. The wife never came in. I think she preferred the drama of believing that her poor husband was being abused.

To make a long story short, resident and family wound up getting free private duty--paid for by the facility!

It's also very disturbing that "abuse" has come to mean anything that displeases a resident.

I hope to leave the profession soon. I'm going back to school to make that happen.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Jan 3, 2009

it seems like patients are getting bigger, more demanding and less grateful. families are out of control, management is more concerned with press-gainey than staff retention and ancillary staff are disappearing. i go through periods of being burned out, too. fortunately they come and they go. i had a great patient last night with a lovely family, so i'm feeling pretty good right now. if you'd caught me two nights ago, though . . .

ams02 · Jan 8, 2009

oh my god, you just took the words out of my mouth...(or off my keyboard) anyway, i am soooo glad to read all these rants and raves because i realize that I am NOT ALONE! its good(?) to know that these things arent just happening at my hospital, maybe someday changes will be made....what about unions?? out of 6 tristate hospitals i only know of one w/union and i really dont know anyone that works there...i dont know what to do, i really want to stay where im at, i work w/an awesome team of nurses and aides, but its only been 2 years, i feel like im 100 yrs old and im only 33! i need to look at other options besides a hospital maybe??