I question this (VENT)

[Reigen]

Last Monday we had a company representative come to give an inservice on a wound vac. This "inservice" lasted over 4 hours, ending with myself (charge nurse for the day) the ADON and the company representative getting the wound vac placed on the Resident. Then the ADON and I helped get the Resident up for supper. After that I as the day charge nurse went back to do the supper time med pass. give report and count narcotics, and then left. I had three days off.

When I returned back to work after being off, I found in my mail box a "Memo", stating that the CNAs were NOT allowed to disconnect the wound vac so that the Rsident could be up. Since I was off I do not know what exactly happend, or who had this happen.

But the rest of this "Memo" states to consider this your first verbal warning, and IF the ADON hears or see the practice of the CNAs disconnecting the wound vac, we will receive another written warning and possible suspension.

I am to sign this "memo" and return it to the ADON.

I do NOT feel that I did anything wrong to get a verbal warning on, and the "Memo" implies that this is a written one as well since it states ANOTHER written will be given IF this happens again.

I just do not feel comfortable in just signing this as it will go into my personal file and be used when it is time to have the work perfomance reviews.

Would anyone just sign and give the employer justification not based on your work to influence your annual review and possible raise?

I am so irrate about how this was handled... no policy and proceedures were made BEFORE this wound vac was obtained and placed on the Resident, and I can see how the facillity would want to clarify the new policy, but to make it both a verbal and written warning and nor even based on my work I feel is unfair and unwarrented.

[Vito Andolini]

I couldn't agree more with all that you said. It is so typical an example of airheaded management. Sadly, these are abundant in our line of work, it seems. No, we don't hold the exclusive patent, but we do have so many horrible managers and ridiculous procedures like this.

Definitely feel free to ignore it comploetely. If they mention it, demand it, whatever, tell them what you said here and ask what the story is, why are you being verbally written up (we have that where I work, too), you were off 3 days, etc., all that you stated so well.

Best wishes.

[Katnip, RN]

You have the right to write a rebuttal stating that at the time there was no written policy on who could disconnect the wound vac, and everything else you mentioned.

Do not just ignore it. It does not have to be signed by you to be in your file. They will just say you were given the memo and you refused to sign which looks even worse. A copy will go into your file whether it's signed or not.

Or before signing, take a copy of the memo and your rebuttal to HR or your DON, your bosse's boss before signing and explain everything. They may be able to get the ADON to rescind.

[Not_A_Hat_Person, RN]

Before signing, I would write a rebuttal, talk to the ADON, and ask for clarification. Is this just meant for the CNAs, who should know better than to disconnect things?

[CapeCodMermaid, RN]

Wow-that's a bad way to handle things.

If there was no policy prior to this, I don't think you could/should get any kind of warning. I would have sent a memo around outlining the policy and asking for any questions. Once you've been informed of the new policy, of course you need to uphold it. Seems like killing an ant with a bomb!

Talk to the ADON and see what her issue was. If she doesn't give a realistic answer, speak to the DON.

[Dalzac, LPN, LVN, RN]

I would want to be sure that is not in your personel file along with other good ideas from other posters. I was accused of something I wasn't even there for. and I made a big deal about it to get it out of my file. And it was taken out

[EverNurseRN]

I would ask the ADON if she'd be willing to change it to an educational inservice..that way she gets her paper trail and nobody looks like they were reprimanded..

[UM Review RN, ASN, RN]

I don't know what type of wound vac your facility is using, but the ones we used did have a battery and were able to be unplugged by the wall plug for a short time. The whole machine went with the resident.

After a certain period of time with the vac off (something like 6-8 hours if I recall correctly), the dressings had to be replaced. (Read: Time consuming and resource-wasting process.)

So I'm not really sure you did anything "wrong" regardless of who unplugged it. It was the person who was putting the resident back to bed who should've plugged it back in who might have made the error.

Here's the KCI brochure, which says it has a 4 hour battery life (scroll down a ways): http://www.kci1.com/images/29-A-101_VAC_ATS_Brochure_11-05.pdf