Longest Shift You've Worked

Nurses General Nursing

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As nurses, there may be times we are required to work long days. The other day, I successfully worked my first 23 hour shift.

What is the longest shift you've ever worked? 

Specializes in Rehab/Nurse Manager.

Maybe I should have accepted defeat on Friday and just let another nurse see if they could take care of the issues when I'd already tried for 12 hours.  But, I do not like failure or going home until I've succeeded in one way or another.  If I go home and someone is still not doing well, then I haven't done my job.  

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Specializes in Psych, Corrections, Med-Surg, Ambulatory.
2 hours ago, SilverBells said:

 If I go home and someone is still not doing well, then I haven't done my job.  

What exactly is your job?  Is there anything in your job description about turning water into wine?  How do your staff feel about you muscling in on everything?

You need to think seriously about where your responsibilities begin and end.  Your god complex is not healthy for your residents, your staff and especially not for you.

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Specializes in Rehab/Nurse Manager.
1 hour ago, TriciaJ said:

What exactly is your job?  Is there anything in your job description about turning water into wine?  How do your staff feel about you muscling in on everything?

You need to think seriously about where your responsibilities begin and end.  Your god complex is not healthy for your residents, your staff and especially not for you.

Good question.  My job  basically entails doing any and everything.  Upper management expects me to handle a large majority of complaints, attend meetings all day, and fill in on the floor if needed.  Floor nurses expect that I do anything they can't get to because "I have more time."  If something goes wrong with a patient or someone is unhappy, everyone blames the unit manager for "not doing enough."

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Specializes in Rehab/Nurse Manager.

Staff do not care about me intervening; in fact, they expect it because I'm the manager.  They also like being able to go home on time

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Specializes in Rehab/Nurse Manager.

Also, if a patient responds better to a different nurse, then I look incompetent as a manager. Managers need to be successful with all patients. 

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Specializes in Psych, Corrections, Med-Surg, Ambulatory.
39 minutes ago, SilverBells said:

Staff do not care about me intervening; in fact, they expect it because I'm the manager.  They also like being able to go home on time

Oh, honey.  Your last 3 posts are so many levels of problematic.  I know middle management is never easy but you've got the entire place trained to dump everything on you.

"They expect..."?  Then how about THEY get used to disappointment?

You seem very complacent about an increasingly alarming situation.  Either you're trolling the **** out of us or you're becoming emotionally shut down.

I'll say it again:  you get no accolades for allowing yourself to be so badly used.  In 5 years you will still be living with your parents, coping with stress-related health problems while your contemporaries are leading rich, full lives.

I think you go to work to feel like an adult because you can't free yourself from the perpetual childhood of living with your parents.  You've got yourself stuck in a loop.

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Specializes in Oncology, ID, Hepatology, Occy Health.
1 hour ago, SilverBells said:

  They also like being able to go home on time

We all do. And so should you.

You failing is that you're not doing your job in the alloted time because you're taking on things that aren't your job.

Noboby thinks you're supernurse. They just think you're stupid.

Carry on like this and you're headed for psychiatry - as a patient.

Look at all the posts above. NOBODY agrees with you. Do something now to end your misery. It's in your hands and your hands only. Otherwise we'll just conclude that you really do love beng a martyr. How long has this thread been going on now? Did you post about your 23 hour shifts just to show off? If you genuinely posted for advice, why don't you take it?

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Specializes in General Internal Medicine, ICU.

If I had a manager like SilverBells, I too, would expect her to do my job and pick up my slack. 

Why not? She’s willing, has no boundaries, can’t say no, and all I’d have to do is dangle the fact that patients aren’t doing well and SilverBells would be wrapped around my finger. And when she tells me she can’t do what I ask of her, I’ll just say that she’s a failure because she’s letting someone else troubleshoot. After all, managers ought be successful with all patients. Just looks bad if a nurse can tackle the issues when a manager should be doing that. Not to mention, when I can’t go home on time, I’ll be unhappy and instead of examining my time management skills, I’ll just blame SilverBells. Thus, the onus of actually doing my job falls on SilverBells, not me. 

Hey, if SilverBells wants to be a martyr, play hero, be a perfectionist super nurse all the while being my manager, I sure as heck am not stopping her. Why would I do that when I get a pretty sweet deal out of enabling SilverBell’s behaviour? 

She encourages staff to treat her as the proverbial door mat and punching bag, and staff should do what the manager wants, right? 

 

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Specializes in retired LTC.
1 hour ago, SilverBells said:

Also, if a patient responds better to a different nurse, then I look incompetent as a manager. Managers need to be successful with all patients. 

Who says???

David - multiple respondents have all said the same things.  So many times too numerous to count. OP is either seeking to wear a martyr's crown of thorns or she seeks a shiny tiara. This has been going on so long that many of us no longer respond seriously.

It just seems so offensive to be continually snookered.

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Specializes in Rehab/Nurse Manager.

The third patient that I wanted to be seen was finally sent to the ER overnight. I'm glad she was sent in, but irritated it took so long.  I had tried all day on Friday (partly why I had worked so long) but she had repeatedly refused.  Family had supported her, stating sending her in would be against her wishes.  On-call provider had stated there wasn't much we could do if they were refusing everything.

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Specializes in Psych, Addictions, SOL (Student of Life).
14 minutes ago, SilverBells said:

The third patient that I wanted to be seen was finally sent to the ER overnight. I'm glad she was sent in, but irritated it took so long.  I had tried all day on Friday (partly why I had worked so long) but she had repeatedly refused.  Family had supported her, stating sending her in would be against her wishes.  On-call provider had stated there wasn't much we could do if they were refusing everything.

So now we are bullying the resident into going to the ER when they clearly don't want to go. If the resident is of sound mind let her/him be. This is exactly why I would not want to be in a nursing home. At the end of the day when my body is winding down I want it to be able to do so in peace. Even the patient's family was against sending them to the ER. 

There is a severely delusional thought process going on here.

Hppy

 

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Specializes in Geriatrics, Dialysis.
1 hour ago, hppygr8ful said:

So now we are bullying the resident into going to the ER when they clearly don't want to go. If the resident is of sound mind let her/him be. This is exactly why I would not want to be in a nursing home. At the end of the day when my body is winding down I want it to be able to do so in peace. Even the patient's family was against sending them to the ER. 

There is a severely delusional thought process going on here.

Hppy

 

Unfortunately this happens in LTC frequently. Especially if there is any doubt about the residents cognitive ability to make sound decisions. The family that supports the residents right to refusal of care is quite often also the family that will hire a lawyer because the facility didn't do everything they could. 

So basically bullying that resident and family with repeated questions "are you sure you won't go to the ER to be seen by a doctor?" is CYA for the frequent charting about the refusal of care necessary to protect the staff when the resident is declining and refusing a higher level of care.

Best course of action is have a care conference with the resident and family, discuss palliative care and once all parties are in agreement with what if any interventions are to be taken get it in writing! Get that DNR order if it's not already in place [you'd be shocked at how many LTC residents clearly on the last of their nine lives are full code!] and care plan for comfort cares only.  We would even go so far as to get a specific MD order stating no hospitalizations if the resident does not want to go to the ER for evaluation and treatment.  

Even with a DNR code status until that comfort care order is in place the nursing staff including the unit manager has to be in CYA mode and document every refusal of care thoroughly. Part of that CYA charting for a resident with a new or recent history of refusals is updating the unit manager or whoever the manager on call is. I'm sure they don't like getting that call especially in the middle of the night but to CYA you bet that call is being made. I'm sure the providers don't like it either when the night nurse calls to get an order to transfer to the ER knowing the resident will probably refuse yet again, but again in CYA mode the order has to obtained so the nurse can document that MD was updated, orders received and resident continued to refuse. 

Delusional thought process? Yes, probably it is but in our lovely litigious society it has to be to protect the facility and staff.

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