I don't know about you, but our census has NOT dropped all week, including today. For every patient we dischaged another was admitted.
The general medicine, surgery, and oncology floors all were half empty, only us and ICU were almost maxed out at capacity, with high acuities as well.
Don't you know the bosses all left early well before noon on Friday only to return on WEDNESDAY, because the hospital made the day AFTER Christmas an "unofficial" holiday for them, but if regular staff try to take ETO, it is forbidden by hospital policy (none allowed the day before or the day after).
When I left at 2000 Christmas eve we had 12 out of 14 beds filled, 10 in isolation, 9 on the vent (we started with 10/12 on the vent) 2 with continous CRRT, 1 ICP monitor. and no one able to transfer to the floor. The other units were slower so they were able to send float help but we didn't have pt's the med/surg floats could take safely. It is difficult enough to float on the holiday let alone float to PICU. It is very difficult to convince an adult ICU nurse that the vented 13 yr old on CRRT is really one of the most stable pt's on the unit.
Our NICU is slower; down about 10-12 babies, allowing us to decrease staff by about 4 RN's per shift. My understanding though is that the General Nursery is busting out busy and the hospital has almost no regular cribs available supposedly because every women within a month of delivery asked to be induced so they could be home before Christmas. Apparently there will be another rush in a couple of days as everyone tries to get their little bundle of "tax deduction" in before the New Year. Sounds pretty callused to be but this is the rumor at work anyway.
Specializes in Peds Cardiology,Peds Neuro,Pedi ER,PICU, IV Jedi.
Our 22 bed cardiology unit is full, though not all with cardiology kids (of course not!) We've got our share of wheezers and gastro kiddos, as well as some others..But we're FULL!! Yaaay...and that's a good thing.
I work in a large facility (over 200 beds) for DD people and we have a lot of "medically fragile" MIs. We had about 10% of our medically stable residents out on home visits. Even though there was still a lot of residents at the facility, it was amazingly calm and smooth. I actually got caught up on my paperwork.
I can't help but wonder what possesses someone who has had cold/cough etc for three days to suddenly come to ED at 3 am on Christmas. I'd much rather tuck into bed with a cup of tea and a bottle of NyQuil.
I worked the 23rd and 24th and they were about the busiest days I have had, so far.
Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.
Tonight is manageable. Nice for a change. We have one on ECMO, an unstable heart transplant, a semi-stable liver transplant, an unstable Norwood, a neonate with RSV who self-extubated a couple of hours ago, a couple of critical airways and three empty beds. Not like Friday night when we had no empty beds, three kids coming back from the OR on our shift, no extra hands anywhere, the tranposrt nurse hving to take a patient, and the manager went home at 2300 knowing it was like that. And today day shift there were three people who stayed from nights to make sure that the day staff got at least one break. The patient care manager came in around lunchtime and pulled some strings, got some kids out and loosened things up a little. We've been seriously jammed for weeks and I hear they're going to start up with the elective CV surgeries again on Wednesday. I'll be on a week off so they can do whatever they want!
When I left work on Sat night at 1900 we were down to 10 pts on our floor which the day before had 28 pts and full. I have not been back. We have been full all year long so I am sure we are probably full again. Happy holidays!!!
We have 33 beds, down to 17 on Christmas Eve. Everytime we would dc, someone would come up. There were quite a few strokes on Christmas eve. We figured people were at the stores stressed out and fighting over last minute gifts.
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km5v6r, EdD, RN
149 Posts
When I left at 2000 Christmas eve we had 12 out of 14 beds filled, 10 in isolation, 9 on the vent (we started with 10/12 on the vent) 2 with continous CRRT, 1 ICP monitor. and no one able to transfer to the floor. The other units were slower so they were able to send float help but we didn't have pt's the med/surg floats could take safely. It is difficult enough to float on the holiday let alone float to PICU. It is very difficult to convince an adult ICU nurse that the vented 13 yr old on CRRT is really one of the most stable pt's on the unit.