Is anyone an admission nurse?

RNDYN2CU · Aug 18, 2006

Hi there, I am a case mngr, just saw 3 of my patients, initiated and staffed and provided care on a continuous care case and then ran over to one of our conv. homes to do an admit... I can't do that every day. I sometimes wish I was just an admit nurse, I'm pretty good at it and sometimes I don't feel on top of my 23 pt load case...My hospice company is wonderful but alas, we need more RN's, and are looking to hire the ever elusive Admit nurse. (Promises promises...)

doodlemom · Aug 18, 2006

23? Good grief! And you staff the continuous care cases yourself? What is the census of the agency?

As far as admissions nursing goes, I did admissions for a while. There are definitely pros and cons. Pros - you see them once and turn them over to someone else (sometimes this is a con when they are really cool people!)

You don't have your pager going off all day with urgent needs. You don't go home and worry about your patients or go home thinking "oh no, did I forget to..." You have set appointments (this can also be a con.)

Cons: You do not make your own schedule so you are at the mercy of the time constraints. Admissions can be long and drawn out if you have a complicated case and you don't have any choice but to finish it up by the next day because the following team needs paperwork to see the patient. Sometimes this can take you well into the evening/night. While there is no Oasis paperwork, the admission paperwork can become long - it is worse if you are on computer. I have done it both ways and computers take more time. If you have a lot of competitors in your area your company will need to satisfy the referral sources. Many times this means that someone needs to be out within a couple of hours of the referral being called in. If you were planning on an easy day, tough...the referral sources are more important. That is another issue - you are the face of your agency...the referral source is always right.

andyg · Aug 22, 2006

I decided that we would use admission nurses at our agency for several reasons. 1st it would provide the case managers additional time to spend with their case loads. 2nd the patients and families would get the "same" story from each of the admission nurses and have less "stuff" that was missed during an admission. This was happening alot with folks that didn't routinely do admissions. 3rd is I could use two to four of my part-time or registry nurses to do nothing but admissions. The admission nurses really enjoy this role and I've not had any of them complain. They also have good working relationships with many of the hospitalist and other docs in the hospital because they also do our hospital referrals. The paperwork is lengthy but once you are familiar with it you pretty much breeze through it. You still work closely with the case managers as what you've seen, done, needs to be done etc when you give them report. Good luck andyg

brainnurse · Aug 23, 2006

I accepted an admissions nurse position with Vitas, here in So. Cal. It's a bit less $$ than I was offered at other agencies doing case mngmt, including admits, but there is no call requirement, and that was meaningful to me. I really do not want to be on night call. I did it practically all my adult life in the OR...now I'm 52, and want to sleep all night. :sleep:

So, any tips or insights about how to survive admissions would be most welcome and appreciated.

Thanks,

Ro

RNDYN2CU · Sep 9, 2006

Glad you picked a company!!! Admissions... I think that is great... how are you doing? I caught this late, i havn't checked in for a while. I make a copy of the H&P and treatment sheets and med sheets and do the head to to assessment and go to town! i had to do 5 my first on call weekend, trial by fire, so I am sure in time you'll get a rhythm. W/B