what's wrong with HCA hospitals?

U.S.A. Kansas

Published

I noticed some others mentioning they would not work in an HCA hospital and I just applied through HCA yesterday. What do I need to look out for or consider when deciding whether or not to work for them?

I worked for HCA for 7+ years and would never work for them again. I don't know how they were named one the "best places to work for 2011" because leadership don't give a rats rear-end about employees or their department managers. A new CEO was hired before I left. He was a young punk and acted like he had all this experience and knew everything. Basically he looked in one direction while shooting in another. The CNO weighed 350-400 lbs and never left her chair.

The HCA website says, "Everyone is a contributor to creating a great place to work. At HCA, we believe our success is dependent on a Healthy Work Environment where caregivers, staff, administrators, physicians and volunteers are at the core of a patients-first culture". The patients do not come first, the top priority is the almightly dollar.

The best facility I worked for was not for profit. My advice to anyone considering HCA: ask current and former employees their thoughts and then run in the other direction.

They are staffing illegally and not according to state law. at one point we had a dozen nurses on our unit alone out on workers comp due to work place injuries. they dump icu patients on our med surg floor without a doc's transfer order because they didn't have sufficient staff in the ICU. the doctors are complaining but nothing will be done. already doctors have ceased to practice here (and they wonder why their census is low, ha!) they have denied us our vacations...even an assistant who had written approval by a manager and had already bought plane tickets. it is an awful hell here and we are treated as slaves. Patients have died here due to staffing issues. oh and finally, we don't get the breaks required by law. and they will throw you into whatever they like, whether you were trained in it or not and risk your license. and that is why patients have died. HCA's mission statement is all PR and nothing more. Satan himself works in our HR department.

against HCA policy to skip lunch? ha! i wish! if you don't get a lunch here, you can charge for it and get an hours pay in lieu, but you have to have a supervisor to sign off on it, which they will never do. they intimidate you instead rather than provide the staffing to do so. i personally like to get my breaks and am ready to take them if someone can relieve me. but we don't get break nurses and often the charge can't break everyone or is in care, etc.

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