How flexible is home health?

[jessimee]

I am currently working on a med/surg unit 1/2 time and am fortunate enough to work 7-3's, set schedule (it's a job share) so I can be home after school. Next year all 4 of my littles will finally be in school full time and I'm thinking about options for filling in the my other 20 hours. 12 hour shifts are not an option. do home health companies require that you commit to a certain number of hours? Can you drop to minimal or no case load in the summer and still keep your job?

[Libby1987]

We love having perdiem staff for the census swings and vacation coverage but we won't train a perdiem nurse without HH experience. There's a lot to learn in HH and training a new HH nurse takes a lot of resources.

[CFLA.RN]

Depends on where you work. I worked a year in the hospital and then went PRN in home health. I don't think any place will let you not work in the summer and then come back in the fall, you would definitely have to keep a minimum of visits or a new PRN person will get preference over you.

[Pedsnurse150]

It probably depends on the agency and their need for help. I started out working one 8 hour shift a week, but would occasionally pick up if they needed me. Now I only work an 8 hour shift every other week- they take what they can get. I'm not sure about taking a whole summer off, but you might be able to get away with working a lot less. The only problem with that is being able to get your regular client/hours back after the summer. When I came back from maternity leave it was a challenge getting my regular hours back.

[NurseSpeedy, ADN, LPN, RN]

I've worked for a few different home health companies that would allow me to go inactive if I did not have any upcoming availability and then reactivate at a later date if I wanted to pick up more shifts/visits. There was one that I had actually quit and called me a few years later, stating that they saw that I had worked for them in the past but was listed as inactive and wanted to know if my situation had changed where I would want to pick up some extra work per diem. Many won't pay anywhere close to what the hospital will pay, but it's good for additional income if desired. The companies that did this were larger (locations in most states) so they had a lot of work to cover.

[Eleven011]

I'm a school nurse and work for a HH agency just during the summer months. There is another gal that does prn during the year, that doesn't help much in the summer because I am there. You never know until you ask!

[Hhcna]

Though I am an aid and I amust speaking from the knowledge of my own company, they are very flexible as long as you make your schedule limits clear, they are typically eager to work with you. Especially having people available for call outs and things of that nature, put your feet in the water and test it out onearly more thing to add to your resume!