Hospice burnout?

[Brightonrn1]

Looking for some advice: I will make this brief. I have been a nurse for 24 years. Twenty of those in the micu. I have been a certified hospice nurse for going on five years. Love my place of employment, love my manager, Drs, etc. Here is the deal, recently i have been case managing assisted living patients five actually. The patients are Dementia patients. Which is fine, but I am bored out of my mind. I so enjoyed being in the field more and going around to people's home. Currently I have four patients in home care. The rest are assisted living and skilled care.

I have experience but again I only has a associates degree. Started back online school for a BSN but working and taking care of four kids left me in tears and I quit after three classses.

Any advice out there?

[tewdles, RN]

You have to re-focus your attentions when you case manage primarily in the facility setting. Med reconciliation becomes a big issue, education of staff rather than family is the norm. Communication between yourself and the family is more complicated and you must keep the LTC staff in the loop.

[curiousauntie]

My advice would be to talk to your manager about how you feel. Hopefully she will really listen to you and try to find a way to give you more home patients and less facility patients. I know how you feel about the facility patients. I worked 22 years in long term care before becoming a hospice nurse and one of the best things about home hospice is that you are not tethered to one place. I might spend a majority of my drive time thinking about the next patient, talking to families on the phone or dealing with support staff, but I also have the option of taking 10 minutes and listening to music, driving in some beautiful farmland or in seaside resort towns.

A few years ago I had close to 50% of my patients in LTC and assisted living facilities. My manager said she thought I liked facility patients as my back ground was mostly LTC. After I informed her that I did not like being in facilities all day and it was making me think about moving on, she re-assigned some of my assisted living patients and that made all the difference.

So take the initiative and talk to your manager. She may not know how you are feeling.