Charge Nurse

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Did any of you get trained to be a charge nurse or were you just thrown to the dogs like I hear many other nurses were ?

Also, on night shifts (med surg) does your charge nurse have a full group of pts?

Specializes in Med-tele, vasc, stroke, neuro.

the only training we receive at my hospital is one day of "job shadowing." i am trying to put together a program that will work. does anyone have an organized charge nurse training? can you give me some ideas of how this is set up?

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Specializes in Acute Care Cardiac, Education, Prof Practice.

Night and day charge nurses carry the same patient load as everyone else on our floor.

And no we don't get thrown to the wolves, we do have a pretty decent prep program and we tend to work together well.

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Specializes in Acute Care Cardiac, Education, Prof Practice.
the only training we receive at my hospital is one day of "job shadowing." i am trying to put together a program that will work. does anyone have an organized charge nurse training? can you give me some ideas of how this is set up?

Kudos to you for working to change the system at your facility!!

:anpom:

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Specializes in Med-tele, vasc, stroke, neuro.

what is your prep program? do you get organized education? books, materials? how many days of training before you are considered ready to be on your own?

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Specializes in Med-tele, vasc, stroke, neuro.

that is the same type of responsibilities that we have on my floor. but with one day of training, (8hrs). during your 2 week training was that simply working with and following your regular charge nurse, or did you get classtime to learn the job as well?

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Specializes in Med-tele, vasc, stroke, neuro.
I too was "thrown to the wolves" Christmas day. I had been an RN for 14 months. I then got trained a full 2 weeks. I work day shift. We do not take pts on day shift but night shift sometimes ends up with a full load of 7 pts. They tried to give me a couple pts one day and I refused stating they could find themselves a new charge nurse and put me back on the floor. I only make a dollar more an hour and its not worth all that extra responsibility on my license. Luckily my nurse manager agrees with me. She will come in and charge and put me on the floor if need be. I have been charging for about 8 months now. I do more then assign beds though....I am responsible for the assignments, assigning beds, checkcing orders, rounding with the doctors, discharges, assisting all my staff regardless of CNA or RN, trouble shooting, rapid responses, difusing situations, I am the one the doctors come to when something isnt done or not done the way they want it done, I need to know what is going on with all the pts on the floor, critical labs, family issues, social work/case management issues, etc...I am quite busy. And at the end of the shift...I am still sitting there trying to finish my orders while everyone else has gone home. It is not as easy charging as it looks to be.

what is your prep program? do you get organized education? books, materials? how many days of training before you are considered ready to be on your own?

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Specializes in orthopaedics.

Charge takes a team on my floor. There is no official orientation to the "charge" position. Just when your number is up you have to do it. Kind of sucks sometimes.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Telemetry, Ortho.

Thrown in 8 months after starting as a new Grad RN. Stayed charge for 5 years until I moved on.

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