Half brained management

nursemary9, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2009

Hi

When we had the state come in last year, we had to do the exact same thing@!!!

Kind of stupid!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MANAGEMENT!!

CathyLew · Jan 2, 2009

Actually, we had to evacuate our entire MSP and CCU floors last month due to a fire in one of the light ballasts right over the MSP nurses station. Once you get a few beds out in the halls moving the bed-bound patients... and someone tries to pass you in a wheel chair, or pushing an IV pole. there isn't any room for anything stored in the halls.

The equipment not being used should be in a clean storage room that has lots of outlets. Not in the halls, and not in the patient rooms.

abbaking · Jan 2, 2009

Actually, we had to evacuate our entire MSP and CCU floors last month due to a fire in one of the light ballasts right over the MSP nurses station. Once you get a few beds out in the halls moving the bed-bound patients... and someone tries to pass you in a wheel chair, or pushing an IV pole. there isn't any room for anything stored in the halls.
The equipment not being used should be in a clean storage room that has lots of outlets. Not in the halls, and not in the patient rooms.

Hey....We dont have clean equipment storage on our unit....and our supplies are stored in carts in the rooms or inside the nurses station. The only place for COWS or BP machines is inside the hallways of the nursing circle (circular unit layout). Management should invest in those laptop computers for charting...with some sort of antitheft device on it or a barcode. This would mean no obstruction in the hallways or room from COWS and it would be modern updated technology (rather than using Iron lungs in our ICU)

nrsang97, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2009

We have no room for that equipment. We have a clean utility room, but no outlets. We have to leave them in the hallways. We have a supply room too, but there is the copy machine, cabinent full of EVD, and camino supplies, extra cables and boxes for monitors, intubation boxes, travel monitors, cabinent with snacks, bladder scanner, dopplers, EKG machine. You can barely walk through that room as it is. So we have no choice. There isn't even any room behind the nurses station for any of that stuff. We don't have the dynamaps, but the WOW (can't call them cow's ) we wouldn't have enough place to plug them in. So really even in pt rooms there isn't any room. When you have the bed, multiple IV poles, vent, EVD, Camino, vigileo, alsius, cooling blanket, etc.

oramar · Jan 3, 2009

You know, in this case I will blame state health dept. They frequently make demands that are impossible to meet. Managment does not want to call attention to the defiencies the health dept does not notice so they go along with it.

Straydandelion · Jan 3, 2009

I am surprised they say nothing about the patient rooms being filled with the equipment!

fuzzywuzzy, CNA · Jan 3, 2009

Our administrator is constantly walking around looking for things to move around. Today I went to put a man in the bathroom and there was a commode AND an ETAC turner crammed in there (probably put there by the admin), so I put them against the wall in the nook by the resident's room, put the resident on the toilet and left. The next thing I know I'm coming back to get him off the toilet because he's ringing and the admin is standing there like "OMG why is this stuff in the hallway?" Um obviously because someone is using the storage closet, I mean BATHROOM.

guest239592 · Jan 3, 2009

Just a suggestion... Do you happen to work in a hospital with nursing councils or feel comfortable bringing this up to management if you don't? It's obviously that needs to be resolved (and i agree with you that it sounds like being in pt rooms is an even bigger hazard!) I'm not sure the structure of your overall unit other than the circular design that is described where management could make an equipment supply room or not. But I think if you have management that is open to suggestions (and I know, some aren't and maybe your facility is one of them) that you should bring it up to see change.

BrnEyedGirl, BSN, MSN, RN, APRN · Jan 3, 2009

Since someone brought up the "half brained" idea,....help me with this. They're making a big issue again about no food in "pt care areas". This becomes an issue every couple of years where I work (ER, Trauma). Now management is throwing a big fit about no drinks or food of any type at the nurses station. I'm not sure why the nurses station is considered a pt care area. The pt's or families aren't even allowed back there! This is the "clean" area, where all of the phones, the computers, printers, fax machine etc are. BUT,.if a pt wants a sandwich, it's OK for me to take the sandwich in the room (major pt care area btw) set that sandwich on the tray we all use to hold IV supplies, place specimens for labeling etc, and allow that pt to eat that sandwich! NASTY! Who makes these rules?

CathyLew · Jan 3, 2009

"making a big issue again about no food in "pt care areas".

Oh yea, this one always gets me... lots of times you don't have time for a break, but you can't have coffee or a soda at the desk. Of course, you see nasty buggers you work with come out of a room with gloves on, holding a stool sample in a bag, and rifle thrugh the kardex for the specimen slip! Or grab the phone to call the lab to see if a half a container of stool is enough to do all the specimens on.... (ok, off on a tangent here!)

Often our CCU nurses don't have anyone to relieve them for a break, and they end up eating lunch and watching monitors.

we had one infection control nurse who would tape a little plastic bug to your cup or soda can if she saw it at the desk. Just to remind you of the germs. :smilecoffeeIlovecof ok, I'll take my chances and finish my coffee!

patrick1rn, MSN, RN, NP · Jan 3, 2009

This just goes to show how half brained and stupid our management is. So last week when the State Health Dept came for yet another unexpected visit, all the nursing staff on all the units had to move all the COWS (Computers On Wheels), BP machines, and other equipment out of the hallways and into patient rooms. The reason - Fire Code = Needs to be an 8 foot clearance at all times. In theroy I agree, but our unit is a circular layout and in some parts of the unit the hallway BY ITSELF is LESS and the required 8 foot minimum.
Let me go out on a limb here and play the devil's advocate....God forbid there is a fire and all our COWS and other equipment are stuffed in the patient rooms....didn't we just entrap the patient by doing this? We have tiny semi-private and triple bed rooms. Can we move the COWS out of the way? Nope cause its a SAFETY ISSUE.
Now let me be realistic and blunt. If there is a fire, those patients who can run are going to; those patients who cant will be made to, and those patients on life support with least expectancy to survive in general are saved last (sad but true as per hospital policy). The COWS and BP machines should be in the hallways NOT TRAPPING PPEOPLE IN THEIR ROOMS!

You blame management, when all they are doing is trying to look like they are enforcing a stupid state policy enacted by someone with good intentions but lack of common sense. I think management was just trying to get the state in and out of this facility, so it can stay open and you can still have your job and complain about how stupid the management is. No I dont work in management, nor do I have any desire to work in administration, but they have the candle burning from both ends. Let me ask you a question, what is the layout of the equipment now that the state is not their.

Its like at night, you really cant go off the floor for your 30 min break in the ICU, its not safe, so you eat your meal at the nurses station in violation of the policy which everyone just overlooks at nice, since it does not make any sense.