IR RN call pay vs Rad Tech call pay

Nurses General Nursing

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I work in a very busy IR dept where we are on call a few nights a week and one weekend a month. Nurses work side by side with radiology techs. There is always 1 nurse and 1 tech on call together...however the Radiology Techs get $6 per hr call pay while nurses get $3. Half the pay for being on call for the same procedures in the same dept. Is this the norm for any other IR depts out there and do nurses have the right to fight for the same call pay as rad techs?

Are these Rad Technologists also certified to do other procedures which they can be called in for? US, MRI or cath lab fill in? At one hospital the on call Rad Technologists never slept and were still expected to work the shift prior and after call while the IR RN only got called in maybe once a week.

But, you are probably making 2 - 3x more on a regular hourly rate than a Rad Technologist ($21 - 32/hr large city teaching hospital) even though the education requirement is the same or more for them. Probably their call back pay does not come close to your straight time. Being on call sucks and if they are only making the usual going rate, it is not worth being on call and turn over would be ridiculously high. Saw that enough with Respiratory and that quickly got old fast. The Radiology Technologists could move on to a place with scheduled staff for the nightshift with no call which could leave your program short. Probably not a shortage of Radiology Technologists but there probably is for those with the IR requirements.

No they are not on call for other modalities or dept areas. We are always called in together nurse/tech. I am definitely NOT making anywhere close to 2 x the hourly rate you mentioned either. I fall into the range you gave. So thT is why I'm so confused at why the call pay differs so much.

If your hourly rate is in that range, their wage might be more like $16 - 25. Our Radiology Technologists are considered very well paid with the wages I quoted earlier and our nurses start around 33 - $35/hr entry grad according to their last union book. No way would I be on call making less than $30/hr on call back.

Specializes in Management, Med/Surg, Clinical Trainer.

Nope...sorry I think that is a load.

If you both are on call you should, at least, get the same on call pay.

An RNs ON call time is just as valuable as an RTs.

In other professions on call pay is based on a % of pay. So if they were giving 5% for on call, and if nursing makes more base salary ....you would still make more. Just because another staff make less per hour does not mean nursing should be slighted. Or nursing should take less pay to offset paying ancillary staff more.

Ancillary staff?

Radiology Technologists are degreed and licensed professionals. Many of those in IR- have at least a Bachelors degree.

There has to be some incentive for these Technologists to stick around if they are disrespected and have to listen to nurses making 2x more complain about how little they make.

Not sure what area you are located in or what type of facility but in our dept the Rad techs and nurses are both at the high end of $20 per hour. They were the ones always complaining so HR evened out the playing field. Nurses are extremely disrespected at our facility as it is a tech oriented and run dept. they even brag about how much they make so I was just looking to see how other depts differ

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PACU.

Are the techs union and nursing not? That is how it is at our hospital and our radiology techs are pretty well

paid and their on call is higher than ours.

And to call them ancillary staff is pretty disrespectful. Those techs

know more about A/P than any of us ever will and can read a film/scan better than some docs.

Neither are union. I did not call them ancillary staff. We both rely heavily on each other as both our roles are equally important in our procedures. As is our commitment to be on call and should be the same.

Specializes in Management, Med/Surg, Clinical Trainer.

Nope that was me..I used ancillary......bad choice of words...I just looked it up.

I thought ancillary meant in addition to......or working with.

Sorry OP.

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