How are some people still employed?

[K+MgSO4, BSN]

Just a vent on my shift. 4 out of 6 nurses working for me today were casual from our pool. 3 of them were excellent. The last however - a loon. At the beginning of shift we have a ward catch up and then do bedside handover. In 10 min I heard 4 giant sighs from this woman. I stopped catch up and asked if she was "OK" basically why she was huffing like greek tradegy. Nothing wrong apparently.

I had to go to a regular meeting but there was 2 educators around the under grad one who only had 2 students instead of 8 so was offering to help and the ward educator.

This woman managed to upset the family of a dying man, **** off 3 different medical teams, grt an anxious man so agitated he wanted to self discharge, upset another family by suggesting they don't allow thier child near their father (pt) because of his wound.

She also walked into an emergency situation looking for someone to check a narcotic with, stopped me as I was grabbing stuff from the trolley in thst emergency to take to another one that required intubation on the ward to check if the dosing of a med was correct......the pharmacist was right beside her.

Seriously how do some people remain employed, even on a casual basis?

also slightly worried about her vision as she had her nose on the keyboard when she was using my computer to text a doctor.

Thanks for listening internet. Will see what happens from my incident report to her manager.

[jadelpn, LPN, EMT-B]

"You are relieved of your duties for the day. Please give me report on the patients you have been assigned. Thank you"

And then a phone call to her supervisor.

Some people are moonbats, but when a nurse is whilst working, they need to go home.

Perhaps now is the time to start talking about permanent nursing positions, recruiting and retention.

[firstinfamily, RN]

I agree with Jadelyn, if the nurse was already exhibiting "symptoms" of inadequacy(sp) why would you leave her on the floor? " Yes, thank you for coming today, however, I see that you are not really prepared to be working and you need to report to the supervisor." Does this mean your staff would be working short, or that you as the manager would have to work over?? Then it is time to address retention with upper management and let them take the responsibility for not providing adequate staff. It cannot all fall on your shoulders. Middle management sucks----sorry, but it truly does!!! You need to have your unit be productive in a positive way and it cannot accomplish this if there are inadequate or not enough staff. It will come down to affecting YOUR evaluation. Personally, I would start to keep a record of who is being sent to you and what their attitude is, and how they are caring for their assigned patients. That way it does not look like you are the main problem!!! Good Luck, this can be extremely frustrating and one of the reasons I left middle management!!!

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

Why so many agency? No matter how good they are, regular staff is preferable.

There are many bad nurses hiding out in agency work. When one is identified ... just don't have them back.

If she is unsafe, report to the BON.

[K+MgSO4, BSN]

Thanks guys. I'm in Victoria so ratios like California. We have flex beds on the ward that were opened at short notice requiring staffing so that is 2 casual staff, one nurse called in sick because she has a broken arm and the other was sick as well. We have no issues with retention, trust me we have a waiting list.

However I am in a public hospital system in Australia and we are governed by different labour laws. The only time I can ask a Nurse to leave is if they assault a pt or appear intoxicated.

Trust me we have a list of do not return with the allocation office, however someone new down there sent her up.

[tarotale]

well you know common sense is a big asset now days... when it should be just that: "common". swear to god some of things and ways these people compute, process and behave lol... honestly i don't consider someone a human until they prove me to be, which by far is easier than convincing me that you can fill up grand canyon with twinkies in less than 2 days;

are you in a unionized state? in that case, it makes sense... or your coworker has friends in high places.

[K+MgSO4, BSN]

Victoria was the first place in the world to have ratios for nursing inbed in law so yes very unionised.

[firstinfamily, RN]

"Common sense is not common any more." What we use to take for granted is now something that is becoming rare. Figuring things out for yourself is almost a rare commodity!!! When do you think this started?? I kind of wonder and this is just a theory that perhaps when we went more computerized, having a machine tell or indicate to you what to do, we lost some of our critical thinking skills. I relate it to the people who play video games, the games are always telling them what to do or give them a "reward". What happens when they have to actually think on their own without any prompts? They feel lost!!! Hence the need for increase education and more hands on training. Are the nurses receiving the proper amount of training to be pulled to another area?

[K+MgSO4, BSN]

She is a casual staff member, she has no home ward, she receives calls from allocation when there is a vacancy, it is up to her to accept or decline.

Apparently she has been nursing for 20 years!