Clinical ladder help.... we must do research now!

[time4nicu]

Okay, I am going to whine a little. Since 2005 I have been on our clinical ladder and have taken it to the highest level which is 4. Every other year I must do a full packet, on off years my packet is very little work. This has been awesome untill this year. Level IIII packets now have to include 12 hours of some sort of research. I am going crazy! All of our unit research is done, and I am left with no project to do. Is is worth it to start a new research project for one more dollar an hour? I am thinking of stepping down to a level III. Anyone else have this problem?

[NICU_babyRN, BSN, RN]

Has anyone in your unit done research on "Neutral Head Positioning for prevention of IVH"? 12hrs a year is NOTHING. You can totally do it.

[llg, PhD, RN]

What will they accept as "research?" For example, would they accept a good literature review of an issue or practice that is of interest to your unit? That wouldn't be all that hard to do and it might lead to a project, practice change, or policy change that would be a good project for next year. Essentially, you would be doing "step 1" of a bigger project to be completed next year.

I would think that 12 hours of work is worth $1.00 per hour easily. If you work $2,000 hours per year, that's over $160.00 per hour of work. I'd gladly work an additional 12 hours to earn $2000.