Hospital rehab/subacute nurses: What are your ratios?

[PAERRN20]

For those of you who work in hospital rehab units or hospital sub-acute units: What are your nurse to patient ratios?

I am starting a new job soon and I will be the charge nurse for approx 15 patients. I will not have med cart duties. The LPN would be responsible for that. Basically I would do all orders and be the charge nurse for whatever issues come up. Some of these patients would have IVs, foleys, major wound care, etc.

I am just wondering if this is about average and if the workload is doable. Thanks!!

[ChynaGrove]

I work on a sub-acute care unit as a CNA. It's a 30 bed unit with a nurse to pt ratio of 3:1 to 5:1. We have one charge nurse for all 30 beds. It's a cardiac unit as well so we have a large number of open heart recovery pts with all sorts of drains and hoses sticking out of pretty much everywhere. It's hectic!

[imintrouble, BSN, RN]

I worked on a "rehab" unit at the hospital where I currently work. Our ratio was pretty much what you describe, except we had to do our own med pass. We had a full house only about half of the time. It was hard work. We could see the acute nurses station from our nurses station. Their ratio was about 5-1 to 7-1. Our pts were transferred to us after 3-5 days of acute care, with exactly the same problelms that originally required a hospitalization. It amazed me that because they passed through our magical door they became less sick and required less time and attention.