Getting more hours as an OR RN?

Editorial Team / Admin · Feb 22, 2015

See if others are willing to give up call. Offer to swap with nurses working off shifts for shift differential. Join a specialty team that takes a lot of call. (Seriously- when I joined the heart team where there's only a few people covering a heck of a lot of call, my paychecks jumped a lot). Pick up a weekend per diem job. Not so sure about the 12 hour shift- those folks generally only work 36 hours/week vs the 8 hour folks who work a full 40 hours/week- seems counterproductive unless the shift differential can more than make up the difference of losing 4 hours.

Unfortunately, that's about it. Many facilities that would otherwise offer overtime don't offer it to OR nurses. My facility has a program where vacant positions can be filled by those wanting overtime- it's available to the whole hospital on the computer. However, OR staff are blocked from using it. My guess would be it's because the OR is a closed unit- nobody floats in, so nobody can float out either.

mhy12784 · Feb 23, 2015

See if others are willing to give up call. Offer to swap with nurses working off shifts for shift differential. Join a specialty team that takes a lot of call. (Seriously- when I joined the heart team where there's only a few people covering a heck of a lot of call, my paychecks jumped a lot). Pick up a weekend per diem job. Not so sure about the 12 hour shift- those folks generally only work 36 hours/week vs the 8 hour folks who work a full 40 hours/week- seems counterproductive unless the shift differential can more than make up the difference of losing 4 hours.
Unfortunately, that's about it. Many facilities that would otherwise offer overtime don't offer it to OR nurses. My facility has a program where vacant positions can be filled by those wanting overtime- it's available to the whole hospital on the computer. However, OR staff are blocked from using it. My guess would be it's because the OR is a closed unit- nobody floats in, so nobody can float out either.

heh guess you work at a much bigger hospital than I do. Theres no teams call wise (ie heart team). Just one call team, and they cover whatever comes in.

8/hr shifts only get 37.5 hours a week (unpaid lunch) vs 36 for 12s so its not that big of a difference.

How difficult would it be to get a perdiem job as an OR nurse ? id love to pick up a perdiem sat/sun 12h shift job. I just figured with the way ORs are run that would be kinda dangerous and scary to have someone who doesn't really know your facility working sparingly.

LA_RN2014 · Mar 12, 2015

Hey we'll take you in Houston! We're always looking for more nurses! Seems like everyone is prego in CVOR, so with 3 on maternity leave we're all alwaysssss getting OT. We run a 24 hour service.

Editorial Team / Admin · Mar 12, 2015

heh guess you work at a much bigger hospital than I do. Theres no teams call wise (ie heart team). Just one call team, and they cover whatever comes in.
8/hr shifts only get 37.5 hours a week (unpaid lunch) vs 36 for 12s so its not that big of a difference.
How difficult would it be to get a perdiem job as an OR nurse ? id love to pick up a perdiem sat/sun 12h shift job. I just figured with the way ORs are run that would be kinda dangerous and scary to have someone who doesn't really know your facility working sparingly.

About 600 beds, 34 ORs, 5 endo rooms, I don't even know how many other procedural type rooms. So yeah, I guess that could be bigger than a lot of places.

Per diem OR may be hard to find- and you'd probably have to complete orientation during the week. I was thinking more along the lines of a per diem job on a floor, or maybe even outside of nursing. I'm currently working on finding a permanent adjunct faculty position in an evening/weekend program- did have a temporary that has since ended. I've had coworkers who do photography as an on the side job, handyman work, that sort of thing. With our crazy schedules (multiple nights of call each week plus the occasional weekend), some people have had to be creative.

ORoxyO · Mar 13, 2015

I work 4 10s at my primary job and have a second contingent job working 1 8-hour shift. If my primary job is slow i can easily pick up more hours at the second job, or get the day day off to myself. Plus the contingent job pays more so it is like working OT.

brillohead, ADN, RN · Mar 14, 2015

Not sure if you're interested in non-OR nursing at all, but you could look into Private Duty Nursing. It's very easy to pick up part-time work in PDN, particularly on weekends.

The downside is that it sometimes doesn't pay as much as floor/OR nursing (although the job I'm on right now pays more than I'd make in the local facilities). The upside is that it's generally not as physically taxing, and you're only working a 1:1 ratio. Depending on acuity / time of day, you can also get a lot of downtime (like how I'm surfing AN while on the job, and I'll soon be doing schoolwork while getting paid, too).