Change of shift call lights

[abbaking]

During shift change (both for RN's and CNA's) the call lights seem to ring alot. If I am near it i will answer it or go in the room and see what the patient needs. I used to be a CNA so to me its no big deal and also its irritating to hear the bell going off.

Other RN's/CNA's will not answer the call lights for anything. Sometimes the red emergency bathroom lights do not get answered in a prompt timely manner.

Our unit secretary helps out but he is tied up with data entry, phones, etc.

So, call lights go un-answered and they ring ring ring.

The nurse manager has a new idea. Let the RN's continue with verbal report but have the CNA's write out the report and BRIEFLY go over any critical information. This will allow the CNA's to cover the floor and answer the call lights.

Does this happen where any of you work?

[ChristineN, BSN, RN]

You know this is BS and i will tell you why, Everyone and I mean everyone i don't care if your God if you are on the floor. You yourself is responsible to answer any and all call lights even the housekeepers. They might not be much help but they can find the people to help and guess what that would be you. Yes you sitting in report the Aids can't do everything passing the buck on to them is a joke this is how lawsuits get started by family members just waiting to get one started. Changeover reports can wait. What you going to a fire? You have a hot date? Want to get home to family? Well so do the people you care for sad thing is they can't go home you can. You are there for them they make up your paycheck so I'm sure 5 mins of your time in your busy life of doing report so you can run out the door can wait. Passing it on to the CNA's only and yes that's why they are there to cover the floor and do a walking changeover but they can only move so fast and they get swamped with call lights themselves. Really like your report is more important then theirs No we all play a roll and who's to say who's report is more important. Were a team out on the floor. Team Work people Team Work. Please take time and answer the call lights an once of prevention is a pound of cure ( God sound's like i use to be a ADON wink ) These are my thoughts use them as you wish....

This is incredibly hard to understand

[Poi Dog]

During shift change at my last facility, the call lights would inevitably start going off and the CNAs who were coming off would just stand there. The CNAs who were coming on would ignore the lights. The RNs were more concerned with giving report to the oncoming CNAs.

People were so anxious to get the hell out of there that the residents would get neglected in that whole 30 minute process. Teamwork was not spoken there at all.

It was a hot clustermess.

[OttawaRPN]

You know this is BS and i will tell you why, Everyone and I mean everyone i don't care if your God if you are on the floor. You yourself is responsible to answer any and all call lights even the housekeepers. They might not be much help but they can find the people to help and guess what that would be you. Yes you sitting in report the Aids can't do everything passing the buck on to them is a joke this is how lawsuits get started by family members just waiting to get one started. Changeover reports can wait. What you going to a fire? You have a hot date? Want to get home to family? Well so do the people you care for sad thing is they can't go home you can. You are there for them they make up your paycheck so I'm sure 5 mins of your time in your busy life of doing report so you can run out the door can wait. Passing it on to the CNA's only and yes that's why they are there to cover the floor and do a walking changeover but they can only move so fast and they get swamped with call lights themselves. Really like your report is more important then theirs No we all play a roll and who's to say who's report is more important. Were a team out on the floor. Team Work people Team Work. Please take time and answer the call lights an once of prevention is a pound of cure ( God sound's like i use to be a ADON wink ) These are my thoughts use them as you wish....

Sorry to be the one to tell you, but my report is more important than my orderly's. Why? Because my orderly reports to me on patient status so, if they've done their job correctly, there shouldn't be anything about the patient I don't know. Besides they are there to assist the nurses, so that's called assisting. And it's none of your business why the nurse wants to go home, if she's off the clock and her replacements are there, then that's what she's supposed to do.

Teamwork is fine but if you're always doing others people's jobs, they quickly take advantage of you and become lazy a$$ while sitting around expecting to be paid for your share of their work. Forget that.

P.S You need to take a crash course in basic sentence structure.

[Forever Sunshine, ASN, RN]

I have no problem answering call lights.

But during shift report, or dinner time, or a med pass. I have to focus on what I am doing(except for dinner.. but thats because I can't leave the dining room). I answer chair and bed alarms only during a med pass. Or else I'll never finish.

[kcochrane]

You know this is BS and i will tell you why, Everyone and I mean everyone i don't care if your God if you are on the floor. You yourself is responsible to answer any and all call lights even the housekeepers. They might not be much help but they can find the people to help and guess what that would be you. Yes you sitting in report the Aids can't do everything passing the buck on to them is a joke this is how lawsuits get started by family members just waiting to get one started. Changeover reports can wait. What you going to a fire? You have a hot date? Want to get home to family? Well so do the people you care for sad thing is they can't go home you can. You are there for them they make up your paycheck so I'm sure 5 mins of your time in your busy life of doing report so you can run out the door can wait. Passing it on to the CNA's only and yes that's why they are there to cover the floor and do a walking changeover but they can only move so fast and they get swamped with call lights themselves. Really like your report is more important then theirs No we all play a roll and who's to say who's report is more important. Were a team out on the floor. Team Work people Team Work. Please take time and answer the call lights an once of prevention is a pound of cure ( God sound's like i use to be a ADON wink ) These are my thoughts use them as you wish....

For 1/2 hour during report we have day shift and night shift CNAs (7-8). They write down all the information about the patients and do walking rounds. They is no reason why they can't answer a few lights while we get report. I get out on time maybe 10% of the time. The CNAs get out on time 100% of the time. I am not too good to answer lights and do so. But if I don't give a proper report than my butt is on the line. The nurses also have to round before they leave after report, so we also take care of residents if needed during that time.

Everyone on my floor runs after a bed alarm. Even RNs.

[imintrouble, BSN, RN]

This whole call light thing is a nightmare for me. My response is off topic, but I couldn't help it.

I answer call lights. I do everything the CNAs do and they know it. Most I work with don't take advantage, and are very appreciative. Some want to work on my team because it means they work less. I really hate those nights.

The result is, it takes me longer to do my OWN job, which is no problem if I get out on time. But, it makes me look...........less competent than the other RNs who are at the desk ready for report waiting to go home. Obviously all the nurses I work with don't feel the same way about call lights.

I'm considering just doing what the other nurses do. Put on the light when the little old lady in 5119 wants to walk to the BR. What do you think?

The nurses who go the extra yard are not treated any better that those who do not. Actually they are considered better, because they can get their work done faster because they don't juggle two jobs.

On topic again, if your light is on at shift change at my hospital you're out of luck. There's probably going to be a 30 minute wait.

[pinkiepie_RN]

Ugh this makes me think of a situation that happened at work earlier this week. Now, I work on a psych unit, but we've got red alarm/call bells in the bathrooms that we respond to often enough. I came out of group report (we get report on all 26 patients on the unit) and went to gather my paperwork for my patients/shift and saw a call bell light outside a patient's door, caddy corner to the nursing station. I go in, knock on the bathroom, and ask what the problem is, seeing that the patient is all dressed, standing up, and looks ready for the day. She started yelling at me that nobody cared about her and that she was appalled that no-one responded to her call. She wanted a bar of soap. *cringe* Patients don't usually press their call lights during change of shift but we don't have a protocol for who answers. Night shift *should* have picked up on the light, or perhaps they did, but I was trapped.

[amarilla, RN]

We have the same problem with change of shift call lights (virtually ignored by both shifts) on my unit. We now are doing bedside report rather than face-to-face in the report room, which has only made this even worse, if that's possible. When you are first coming on, the hallway already is lit up like Christmas.

When I was first hired on this floor, (then a tech), we used to do a mini-handoff report from tech to tech. You would have the essential data - activity, diet, precautions, tele/sitter, etc - and could cover lights until your nurses got out of report. For some inane reason, management decided this report was 'unnecessary', and now the techs wait around at the station until they receive report directly from the nurse. Asinine.

If anyone has better handoff ideas that work at your facility, I'll look forward to reading them! We could use the help too, OP.

[TickyRN]

hourly rounding rocks!!! and works at my hospital. I work nights so btw 5.30 to 6.30 am, I check on my patients for 5 ps pain, potty, pump etc , and I (and other nurses) are quick to tell them to let us know if they need anything else before we go into report at 7am, or else they might have to wait till we are done around 7.30. Techs do bedside reporting so they are available during shift change while the nurses do a face to face report. However, both the offgoing nurse and the on-coming nurse both go into the patients' rooms at the end of report to introduce the new nurse to the patient.

[TickyRN]

Also to add, time mismanagement is doing your job and the tech/cna's job at the same time. I will mostly assist my tech if she is busy with another pt and her team members are unavailable. Too often i see nurses doing CNA duties while the rest of the CNAs are sitting in the breakroom (not on lunch/dinner break) doing nothing. You cant assign RN/LPN duties to a tech so delegate folks.

And yeah, I have never seen a tech/cna clock out late because they were too busy, No matter how understaffed the floor is, they will leave on time. Whereas, whenever the floors are understaffed, nurses would switch to supermode and do double-duty. How will management ever learn when nurses never let them understand the impact of inadequate staffing.

[chinacatSN]

I've worked as a CNA in both hospitals and LTC, Every place I've worked has required the on coming shift to clock in 15 minutes early. On coming shift gets report from the off going NURSES while the off going CNAs answer call lights. Works great!

It does annoy me, too, when nurses/aides won't or don't answer lights or alarms - especially when some of them are sitting on their butts at the station. I REALLY hate when aides won't answer a light because "That's not my patient". UGH.

[linearthinker, DNP, RN]

No, call lights don't get answered during report. We are a 3-4 bed critical care unit. We can see and hear all the patients from the nsg desk, so if it were dire, we'd know. This is a one nurse unit, no unit clerk, no CNA. We'd have to stop report, go in there and find out what they want. They just have to wait.