I work at a LTC. The facility uses alarms on fall risk residents. The hall I work on has 26 residents. 8 of those resident have alarms. I had a lady with an alarm in the bathroom. We are not supposed to leave these people unattented, but the lady across the hall has demientia and was getting out of bed and her alarm was ringing. She is very unsteady and would have surely fell if I didn't get to her in time. So, I hooked the lady who was on the toilet to the rail with her alarm and told her not too move (she is alert and oriented, she just needs assistance to the bathroom) while I ran to get the other lady.
While taking care of the demintia woman the nurse bust into the room and tells me I needed to go pick other lady off of the floor. The first lady had wiped and tried to stand to pull her pants up and slide down on her bottom. She wasn't hurt at all. But when she slide down on her bottom it casued her alarm to go off. I didn't hear it across the hall. The nurse said she heard the alarm from the employee bathroom (which is right by my hall) and when no one got it right away she came down the hall.
Long story short I got wrote up by the nurse.
What would you have done differently? Its not uncommon to have 2 or 3 alrms going off at once at any given time. We have one aide on a hall for 26 people, so its just me. Our nurses station is not on the hall. Its up front at a large desk. Once they are done passing meds they generally don't come back done the hall unless they have to.
I'm so sorry that it's like that for you! I agree that it's illegal, and terribly unsafe for you and the residents!!! I hope that they somehow are found out that this is happening and things change! It's not right at all that the nurses believe that they are too good to do any type of aide work! I hope that things either change there for you or you find another job very soon!!
I agree with the others. I've worked both acute and ltc and completely understand. Just a note: you can't get in trouble if the care plan is followed. Mats alarms etc in place they can't write you up. Have you tried asking the nurses if they can chart closer to you? I know they're mean but its worth a shot.
wow 26:1? 22:1 is pretty bad, but 26:1 i would be overwhelmed!
you asked for some advice, so here is mine: i would finish with resident 1 first, then answer the 2nd one. at least in my opinion, you can't get in trouble for helping one fall risk resident, instead of another. your employer should recognize that you can't be in two places at once, and if they want to minimize situations like this, then they would/should have a 2nd aide on the floor to help out.
I work at a LTC. The facility uses alarms on fall risk residents. The hall I work on has 26 residents. 8 of those resident have alarms. I had a lady with an alarm in the bathroom. We are not supposed to leave these people unattented, but the lady across the hall has demientia and was getting out of bed and her alarm was ringing. She is very unsteady and would have surely fell if I didn't get to her in time. So, I hooked the lady who was on the toilet to the rail with her alarm and told her not too move (she is alert and oriented, she just needs assistance to the bathroom) while I ran to get the other lady.
While taking care of the demintia woman the nurse bust into the room and tells me I needed to go pick other lady off of the floor. The first lady had wiped and tried to stand to pull her pants up and slide down on her bottom. She wasn't hurt at all. But when she slide down on her bottom it casued her alarm to go off. I didn't hear it across the hall. The nurse said she heard the alarm from the employee bathroom (which is right by my hall) and when no one got it right away she came down the hall.
Long story short I got wrote up by the nurse.
What would you have done differently? Its not uncommon to have 2 or 3 alrms going off at once at any given time. We have one aide on a hall for 26 people, so its just me. Our nurses station is not on the hall. Its up front at a large desk. Once they are done passing meds they generally don't come back done the hall unless they have to.
First of all, 26:1 with how many nurses. just that one? I don't work in LTC, I'm at a hospital, but if we are short a PCT and have to have that many patients, there are atleast 6 nurses around! So if you don't have many nurses either, that's even worse (quit, quit now!!!!) and I feel your pain girl. HOWEVER, I have to say I disagree with some of the previous posters- there WAS a right choice in that situation. Where I work, we have bed/chair alarms too, and if we take someone to the bathroom, or are helping them to the commode, etc, and another alarm goes off, we stay put and keep helping/supervising that first person- end of story. You finish one task before you start another.
I know that it is hard, emotionally to do this, but think about it this way: if you leave person A to help person B because her issue seems more pressing, then have to leave person B for C because C needs more help, have you really accomplished anything? You've left several things in-progress, instead of calling for back up. If that nurse really could've heard that alarm, she could've heard you yelling for help too I bet. If you don't have a cell phone/walkie-talkie system there, then just stick your head out the door and yell for help! Maybe I just see this differently because I work for an awesome hospital that really does have a great team, and we all depend on each other so much, but I think that if you call for help in a situation like that, and don't leave who ever you're with to begin with... then you can't be blamed for not rescuing the second patient- just because you have a 26 patient load doesn't mean that you can be in 26 patients at once! And THAT you cannot be written up for!
I hope this helps, and I hope things get better at work for ya girl! :)
I am lucky as of right in regards to where I work. It's an AFH licensed for six clients. We have five currently as one passed away right before I was hired and all of the current five are self-care other than fixing them meals and handing out meds; they can all do most of their basic ADLs including toileting themselves and changing their own briefs. Anyway, we have alarm buzzers for each client located in their bedrooms in case they fall out of bed or some other emergency happens at night. During the day they are hanging around the house and if they need something they just call me and I'm there. But, the alarms/buzzers are ONLY for life-and-death-fallen-and-can't-get-up emergencies. Since I sleep in the basement when I work there I put the alarm base near my bed so that I can hear if any of the clients sleeping upstairs needs me, but if one of them rings me and I go up to check, (because we MUST race to the alarm no matter what), and they just need a drink of water or their brief changed we are to gently remind them that they are perfectly capable of changing their own briefs and/or getting their own water during the day and that the alarm is ONLY for emergencies. BUT, that said; we help them anyway because we are there anyway and to just walk away and say no, we can't do that would be neglect. So, where I work, I'm lucky in that the clients are pretty much self-reliant and I've only been woken by an alarm three times in the pace of the month and a half I've been working there, but I know that can change once we get our six and final client and as the people there get older I know that their risks of falling will increase which I think it would be a good idea to have a way to clip the alarm buttons on each client and have the base plugged in upstairs (it's very, very loud), during the day and downstairs at night so I, or whoever's on shift, will be able to hear it no matter where we or the clients are in the house. I think that 6 clients per 1 caregiver is reasonable. Any more than that and it ups the risk factors tremendously!
Brannray
79 Posts
I'm so sorry that it's like that for you! I agree that it's illegal, and terribly unsafe for you and the residents!!! I hope that they somehow are found out that this is happening and things change! It's not right at all that the nurses believe that they are too good to do any type of aide work! I hope that things either change there for you or you find another job very soon!!