Do Other Professionals Skip Restroom Breaks And Meals?

Nurses routinely skip restroom breaks and lunch periods, especially if they are employed in bedside settings. However, no reasonable person can work nonstop, day after day, year after year without feeling some type of resentment, bitterness, and burnout. To optimally take care of patients, we need to take care of ourselves first. It is time to start taking our breaks. Nurses Announcements Archive Article

Do Other Professionals Skip Restroom Breaks And Meals?

I sometimes believe that inpatient bedside nursing is intertwined in a bizarre professional culture where the skipping of bathroom breaks and lunch periods is not only common, but occasionally encouraged by our peers and the powers that be.

Can you name any other professionals who systematically place the needs of their clients above their own?

Countless nursing staff members who work in inpatient bedside settings such as hospitals and nursing homes frequently bypass the breaks to which they are legally entitled. According to a study that was supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (2005), nurses are regularly sacrificing their breaks and meal periods to provide patient care. Although many of us already knew that that this practice was going on for quite some time, it does not bode very well for our personal health or job satisfaction.

After all, who wants to work anywhere from eight to twelve hours in a physically demanding role without any breaks?

I can see why numerous nurses explore career options away from the bedside.

According to Fink (2010), while the research confirms what nurses have known for years-few nurses get full breaks; long shifts + heavy responsibility + lack of breaks = fatigue and increased potential for mistakes-part of the blame may lie with nurses themselves. Some nurses forgo their breaks, especially in facilities with toxic work environments, because their callous coworkers or unsympathetic supervisors will endlessly gripe about having to cover an additional patient load during the time away from the floor. Other nurses skip breaks because they feel they might fall further behind with their tasks if they sit down for an uninterrupted lunch or leave the unit to use the restroom.

And even though healthcare facilities must legally pay nonexempt employees who work through unpaid meal periods, the managerial staff at some of these workplaces may subtly discourage nurses from completing 'no lunch' paperwork by taking disciplinary action against workers who submit a large number of these forms.

It is clear that both bedside nurses and the powers that be share some blame for this problem. Facilities need to do their part by encouraging staff to take all legally entitled breaks while taking steps to ease the intense workload.

The workload of bedside nurses can be made more manageable through safe staffing ratios, more streamlined charting, less redundant paperwork, and supportive management. Nurses must do their part by taking all breaks to which they are entitled and willingly covering the patient load of coworkers who wish to leave the floor for a break. Some hospitals employ part-time relief nurses who are on the unit solely to cover for breaks.

In summary, we must take care of our bodies and minds by taking breaks. No reasonable person can work nonstop day after day, year after year without feeling some type of resentment and burnout. To optimally take care of patients, we need to take care of ourselves first.

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TheCommuter

About TheCommuter, BSN, RN

TheCommuter, BSN, RN, CRRN is a longtime physical rehabilitation nurse who has varied experiences upon which to draw for her articles. She was an LPN/LVN for more than four years prior to becoming a Registered Nurse.

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I was a teacher for close to 20 years and there were MANY MANY days when I didn't have time to go to the bathroom! I wanted to, I needed to....but I couldn't leave my class of 5 year olds alone so I learned to hold it. As far as lunches, we had to eat lunch with the class, which meant helping sixteen 5 year olds open their lunch boxes, open straws for their juice boxes, prod them to eat the healthy stuff first, remind them to sit down and use their indoor voice....oh yeah, and try to shove in a few bites of MY lunch before lunch was over. :)

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I was a teacher for close to 20 years and there were MANY MANY days when I didn't have time to go to the bathroom! I wanted to, I needed to....but I couldn't leave my class of 5 year olds alone so I learned to hold it. As far as lunches, we had to eat lunch with the class, which meant helping sixteen 5 year olds open their lunch boxes, open straws for their juice boxes, prod them to eat the healthy stuff first, remind them to sit down and use their indoor voice....oh yeah, and try to shove in a few bites of MY lunch before lunch was over. :)

I understand that, but teachers are not with their classes for 12 hours at a time (not even eight in most cases).

Nurses, sadly, have impossible workloads and often have to make a choice: do I take the lunch I'm getting docked for (and certainly don't ask for payment for it) or do I have to stay that much longer after my shift is over to complete paperwork? As for the other breaks that we're entitled to... don't make me laugh. The only time I ever got those was in outpatient settings.

I wish we had a union :(

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Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
I was a teacher for close to 20 years and there were MANY MANY days when I didn't have time to go to the bathroom! I wanted to, I needed to....but I couldn't leave my class of 5 year olds alone so I learned to hold it. As far as lunches, we had to eat lunch with the class, which meant helping sixteen 5 year olds open their lunch boxes, open straws for their juice boxes, prod them to eat the healthy stuff first, remind them to sit down and use their indoor voice....oh yeah, and try to shove in a few bites of MY lunch before lunch was over. :)

That sounds like a violation of the Geneva Convention.

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Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.

Nurses do not have the corner market on suffering in the workplace, and it makes us sound a little whiney when we discount what other people go through to earn a living. Yeah, it can be brutal, but a bad day in nursing is better than a good day working in a coal mine. (Raise your hand if you've got a song stuck in your head now.) ;)

FWIW, there were many times that my fellow co-workers who were not nurses went without meals or bathroom breaks--routinely.

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Specializes in Emergency/Cath Lab.

I dont get why people dont take the 2 minutes to pee. Take care of yourself before taking care of others.

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Teachers--so many unpaid hours! I've known research scientists who work with no pay for months to have any hope of getting credit for their work and ever landing a position again. I agree nurses and aides are run off their feet and that is flat out counterproductive and stupid, but we don't corner the market on suffering for others. We'd do better as a profession if we didnt talk about being martyrs as if we had no choice or secretly enjoyed it.

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People who wait tables may go 12 hours without a break. I've done it many times. It was just too complicated to find someone to watch my tables, get all undressed to use the restroom, and get all back together the way I needed to be in a short enough amount of time. There were many days I work 8-12 hours without a full dinner/lunch break when we were busy.

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Specializes in ED, Flight.

Soldiers. Police. Firefighters. EMS crews. Flight Medical crews. Physicians. Shall I continue?

I don't think skipping lunches or pee breaks should be a regular thing. If it is, then the unit must be sorely understaffed. But there are occasions in several professions where the professional is called upon to put up with some discomfort and forgo their own needs. I think our noble and demanding professions sometimes require this of us.

For the record: I have been a soldier, paramedic, flight nurse/medic, ER nurse, SAR medic. I am married to a physician. There have been quite a few times for both of us when the job simply demanded we do or give more. Including missing a meal break or bathroom break or sleep. We chose these jobs, and that comes with the territory; though it shouldn't be a constant.

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

There was a big accident on the highway. How did the police know who the nurses were?

They were the ones with the empty stomachs, the full bladders, and the chewed asses.

We all chose this profession. Unless you're working in the OR on a lengthy surgery, you can find the time to pee.

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Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
People who wait tables may go 12 hours without a break. I've done it many times. It was just too complicated to find someone to watch my tables, get all undressed to use the restroom, and get all back together the way I needed to be in a short enough amount of time. There were many days I work 8-12 hours without a full dinner/lunch break when we were busy.

Whenever I eat out, I always make a habit of giving the waitress/waiter a good tip. They work hard, get paid cr@p most of the time and deal with a lot of miserable people. Even if the service isn't that good, I leave a decent tip. Unless it's a habit for the waitstaff at a restaurant to be nasty, I chalk it up to someone having a bad day. Maybe the waitress just got chewed by her mgr., then had to handle a table full of obnoxious, demanding customers. And it's been 10 hours since she peed and she had no lunch.

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If you can't take the 1-2 minutes to use the washroom, you're extremely, extremely bad at time management. That's no one's fault but your own. Heck, even in the middle of very busy overnight calls, I've found the 2 minutes it takes to use the washroom.

Now, the food thing is definitely a legitimate complaint. I usually carry a bunch of protein bars or fruit around with me in case I don't have time to grab a full meal (which is a pretty common occurrence) and they work out pretty well. Takes only a couple of minutes to eat and can keep me going for a few more hours.

Nurses do not have the corner market on suffering in the workplace, and it makes us sound a little whiney when we discount what other people go through to earn a living. Yeah, it can be brutal, but a bad day in nursing is better than a good day working in a coal mine. (Raise your hand if you've got a song stuck in your head now.) ;)

FWIW, there were many times that my fellow co-workers who were not nurses went without meals or bathroom breaks--routinely.

I dont get why people dont take the 2 minutes to pee. Take care of yourself before taking care of others.

Soldiers. Police. Firefighters. EMS crews. Flight Medical crews. Physicians. Shall I continue?

I don't think skipping lunches or pee breaks should be a regular thing. If it is, then the unit must be sorely understaffed. But there are occasions in several professions where the professional is called upon to put up with some discomfort and forgo their own needs. I think our noble and demanding professions sometimes require this of us.

For the record: I have been a soldier, paramedic, flight nurse/medic, ER nurse, SAR medic. I am married to a physician. There have been quite a few times for both of us when the job simply demanded we do or give more. Including missing a meal break or bathroom break or sleep. We chose these jobs, and that comes with the territory; though it shouldn't be a constant.

Agreed with all of these.

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