can't do enough (kinda long)

[blue280]

I just had the shift from hell! Worked 7p to 7:30a on Sunday to Monday. 14 pts on the floor, 2RNs 1 aide so we take 2 pts as total cares. Not to bad, right? pts with total hips replacements, both are 92 and confused as all heck. Can't get orders for restraints but the doctor will order haldol prn of course so its up to my dicrection and Lord knows, I better not overmedicate! Both are pulling at their IVs and foleys and when I call for mitts I'm told not to restrain at all just give more Haldol. My admit is a man who speaks only Spanish and the interpeter wnats to assess over the phone so she doesn't have to come in. My trach pt is spikiing a temp and needs suctioning every 1-2 hrs. Thank God for my total knee pt that only woke up once thru the night for pain meds! The pt next to her is a woman who found out her remission from CA is over and wants to talk. Last but not least is the pt who had "stomach pain" who is a frequent visitor to our floor. OK, I'm working my butt off but around 4am I think I just might gret out with only 1 hr of OT when "stomach pain" lady does her famous trick of "falling" I unfortunately was with one of the hip pt convincing her to leave her foley alone when I got called into her room. Shes on the floor and states she can't get up. Weighs around 300lbs so I call security for help. Guy comes up and states he won't help "with all these people sitting around on their a** eS. aides hear this and cop an attitude. All I want is t get her back to bed! While helping lift, somehow the patient turns, I twist my back and the pt pins me under her on the bed. While this is going on, my confused hip pt got out of bed, and attempted to go sit on a chair in her room. She was found crawling on the floor. Filled out incident reports for 2 hours after my shift ended. I hope this is as bad as it gets! Sorry so long but I just had to vent. Thanks for listening

[Sherrigillis]

I definately have to admire you DARNMOM, I work as an aide on a 36 bed medsurg unit in a brand new state of the art hospital. You would think that we would have ample staff, but we have a massive turnover of help. The sad thing is it's not the staff the doing the suffering, it's the patients, especially when you not only

have a large number of pts, but the acuity is just as high.

[P_RN, ADN, RN]

Bless you. ((((((((MOM)))))))

[blue280]

I'm soo excited! I'm going tomorrow for an interview at a hospital within walking distance of my house and it for FIRST SHIFT!!! I hope I remenber what its like to have a schedule like normal people! No more every weekend! I am keeping my fingers crossed that this comes thru for me, cuz I really need to leave all the politicall BS behind me. I know I'll run into it anywhere but mt manager seems to continually look in the other direction with this. I recently floated to another floor in the hospital and found their staffing matrix was very different than ours. He says he has no controll but the manager in the other dept says that she determines staffing needs. Hopefully the new facility I go to is more consistent. Thanks to all for all the support you've shown me, y'all rock!