12 hour shifts vs. 8 hour shifts

Nurses General Nursing

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Nurses, please give me some inputs please. I am wondering for those who do 12 hours shift, do you feel like you have enough time with your children? Some say, no because they feel like they are always working such as working every other weekend and have to work on holidays and feel that they do not get to spend much time with their kids. Is that so? What about days when you're off, is that enough time?

For 8 hour shifts, do you feel like you are always working? Do you feel this gives you enough time off to have time with your kids?

Specializes in med surg, ed, icu.

I have worked both 8 and 12 hours shifts. I recently left 12 hour night shifts because all I felt that I did was work, go home go to bed and get up take a shower and go back to work. I was exhausted on my days off. I will be starting 12 hour days soon. I have worked these before and they work out good for me. My husband and I have not children but he has health issues that require a lot of time so the 12 hour nights did not work for me. The extra days off that come with the 12 hours are a great bonus. Everyone is different though and has their reason for needing to work the shift that they are working.

Specializes in ADON at LTC, Previous PCU, Ortho etc....

I have worked 12s, 16s, and 8s and can tell you that it is only good as a change from time to time. Weather you working 10,8,16, or 12 hrs you still have to work the same number of hours and you will feel stressed no matter how you break it.

working 2 16s gives you 5 days off but actually working 16hrs is a pure torture, 12s, if you work 3 in a row leaves you drained for the rest of the week, 8 are not bad but you have to work all the time, feels like you at work every day.

So IMHO the best way is to change things up once in a while and work 12 for a while, then switch to 16, then 8 and back to 12etc.;)

Specializes in Home Health Care.

I hate 12's! esp overnight 12's.....I am currently working Mon-Fri 8a-4:30p. I have 3 busy kids, this works out so much better for my family. It also helps I do home Health care , so my schedule is even more flexible. I wouldn't want to go to any other schedule except maybe 10am-2pm!

Specializes in ER, urgent care.

I love working 12's but I used to work 24's as a medic so this is a piece of cake. I don't have a phone in my bedroom and my cell phone is silenced so I don't get woke up. Also I can turn my doorbell off. I sleep with earplugs and my bedroom window covered and a fan running. I can sleep anywere anytime if I'm tired. My family likes it because every 2 weeks I get a 6 day stretch off. I work nights and love that too, not so many extra people around.

I love 12 hour shifts either nights or days. 5 x 8 hour nights felt like I didn't have a life. I felt like the weekend I did have off was spent sleeping or feeling fatiqued. With 12 hour nights, I nap for 4 hours on the start of my 4 days off and I arrange all of my no brainer chores and appointments on that first day. That night I go to bed at a decent hour and have a smooth transition.

The other shift I liked was 10 hour days at a clinic from 0700 to 1730.

I agree with you with the 12s shift. You feel really drained. I worked nights 12s and I felt as though I could not get enough rest. I agree with everything you said 100%.

I have done 12s at night as a LPN. Now, I am a new RN and I don't want to go back to the 12s at night. If I do 12s I perfer days. I have a inteview at a hospital. They have a package of 7 on and 7 off which consists of 5 8s (3-11) during the week and 2 12s (7a-7p) on weekend then off 7 full days :D. I think that I am gonna love that. I get to come home to my husband and child every night, and spend some hours with child before work and be off 7 straight. It sounds good but time will tell. I also love my family and want to spend quality time with them. It is hard as a nurse to spend time with family BUT it can be done. You just have to find the right schedule that accomendates your family. You might want to think about doing 3-1-3 days off 7. Meaning work 3 off 1 work 3 and off 7 days. I would not recommend doing that on nights. Good Luck ;)

Specializes in Peds!, Home Health, DD/MI.

I used to do 3 12's and yes, I was always fatigued, but I had multiple days off with my children. I switched to 8's about a year ago and its just a different kind of fatigue and I still have to make sacrifices. IMHO, they both have their pro's and cons, but unfortunately as a working parent, I will always feel like I never have enough time for my children! I will say though, that with 12's, it saved us money on daycare (less days used) and made it easier to plan family vacations when I only had to ask for 2 or 3 days off instead of 5.

Specializes in ICU, CVICU, Surgical, LTAC.
I currently work 3-12's Night shift and it is tough, mentally, physically and emotionally. Yes you get the 3-4days off during the week but you are drained. My schedule varies week to week. After getting off of work I try to sleep but then so many people call the phone so that wakes you up for most of the morning. I can say I am able to set appointments but that means that I have to stay awake longer until I get to the appointment so now I have been up for 14-16 hours. When I do sleep I really crash not waking until late in the evening and then I still do not feel fully recharged.

If my 12's are back to back I sleep for about 3-5hours and then I am back up to do the same thing over again. My appetite is poor cause I do not eat but once a day when I am working cause I am so tired from working. If I do eat I run into Dunkin Donuts or Burger King and grab something then I fall right to sleep.

Now that I am in school full time the energy level is totally drained. Cause my waking hours is spent doing school work, going to class, trying to have a somewhat normal life on my off days. I have recently been diagnosed with some ailments that never affected me before, so maybe working nights has helped me with early diagnoses.

But one good thing that came from nights is that I am losing weight.

I have worked 8hr shifts but only part-time and I had no problem with that. :nurse:

Wow you nailed it! This is an exact depiction of how it is working 12 hour nights. Unfortunately I am stuck doing it for childcare reasons (I work opposite shifts of my husband so that we can switch of watching the kids) which by the way doesn nothing for my marraige life. I work mostly weekends also just to make it easier for myself ( i am busy playing mom during the week, running the kids to and from school etc), which does nothing for my social life by the way, and forget having any holidays off.

One of the main reasons i went back to school to pursue nursing was for all the reasons i mentioned above that I thought would be so great, but actually suck in real life. I thought having more days off and not having to pay for childcare would make our lives so much easier. But i soon realized that the grass is definately NOT greener.

I work 7-3 and HATE it!! I had a Homecare job Mon, Tues, Wed nights 6pm-6am and loved it, but it was agency and no benefits.

I worked 12 hour shifts, mostly days. I worked nights full time temporarily and it drained me so much that I felt as if I didn't have any days off. I will be returning to work after maternity leave doing PRN nights. Hopefully doing two nights a week won't drain me as much. I do like the 12's over the 8 hrs because I used to be able to have a little me time during the day when family is away. But with new baby and new schedule, we will see how the dynamic is going to change. My fingers are crossed that I won't be like a zombie watching my life go by and not doing any living.

Has anyone done 2 -12s and 2- 8s? I think that, for me, with 3 small children, this might work out well, but I'm not sure. There is the drawback of 4 shifts per week instead of 3, but I think it will allow me to be able to go to more activities.

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