Longterm care horrendous working conditions.

Specialties Geriatric

Published

What has happened? STNA's who are not disciplined for aggressive verbal attacks on other staff members. Nurses who are not held accountable for work undone. Nurses who complete their 8 hour assignment with workload complete and forced to complete work of others who will not complete theirs. Threatened verbally if you report STNA's who are providing substandard care. Nurses are being held responsible for all secretarial duties. any jobs that other departments do not want to complete "just make nursing do it". IE: MDS duties, maintenance duties. The list goes on. Do a complete admission including orders, care plan, head to toe assessments etc.... If you are a fast typist can be completed in 3 1/2hours, if not then 4 hours. Plus 2 med passes totaling 4 hours. Well, let's see that is 8 hours. Where is the time for tx's, phone answering all shift, toileting, UDA's on PCC? Stna's have a union and administration is petrified of enforcing anything. Floor nurses have no authority, all write ups are discarded or not addressed. Nurses verbally attacking other nurses if you call them out for critical work left undone. Shift to shift reports consist of "I don't know and i don't know that either". OMG 4 DON, 3 adminstrator in 2 years. Heck most of the nurses who on board and get their first clue of the culture are running out the back door never to be heard from again. Patient's and resident's wounds that the dressing's are not being changed for a week or more IE: Same initials on dressings from 5 days prior. State in the building every week since i started. Cursing loudly among staff members. If you try to correct situation, forget it, then you are public enemy number one. Appointments for patient's that are cancelled on a continuous basis because of absolutely no follow through. Medications missing on a daily basis pharmacy blames staff, staff blame pharmacy end result patient/resident does not get their medications. Tremendous amount of patient's that are fall risks assigned to one STNA then backlash if you cannot provide continual 1 to 1 care and also complete all other duties. IMPOSSIBLE SITUATION!!!!

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Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.

Not all long term care facilities are bad.

Nonetheless, I worked in LTC for six years. A myriad of reasons exist for my unceremonious exit from the nursing home industry five years ago, some of which were mentioned in the previous post.

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TheCommuter, I have worked in and out of skilled, LTC, rehab, dementia over the last 22 years. Prisoners are treated better!!! I cry when i come home because it is plain chaos and every want and wish to fix things is met a brick wall.

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Specializes in Psych, Corrections, Med-Surg, Ambulatory.

The place sucks. Get out. The State keeps visiting, but nothing changes? Why don't you call them up and tell them where the bodies are? On your way out the door, that is. Good luck.

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Specializes in Geriatrics, Home Health.

I faced the same issues during my stints in an ALF and in Nursing Home Hell, minus the union. I will sell my body on the street before I work LTC again.

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If I had a family member staying there, or if I was a resident's POA, I'd sure want to know what was going on. I know for a fact, if it were me, that I'd raise holy hell in every legal way possible to ensure that issues were addressed.

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Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.

Moved to the LTC forum for more replies.

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Specializes in LTC, Hospice, Case Management.

Left LTC 2013 after 25+ years working my way up from aide to DON due to much of the reasons above. Said I was never ever ever going back to LTC. Well, you know how the story goes....plans/God laugh/etc.

I've been back in for 4-5 months now. Accepted an interim DON, that turned permanent position from an old boss. Facility in a very tiny rural town and old boss promised this would be different than any facility we'd been in before. We'd worked together before in a high class, crazy, start up, high medicare turnaround facility. We only half liked each other but often argued a bit due to the craziness of the place.

This time, he is 100% correct. Now I remember why I loved LTC. Nice little 45 bed facility, good "hometown" type employees as well as families. Expectations are reasonable for all levels of employees and as a result, care is good for residents and staff is happy. Families are obviously happy because their person is happy. (Think - no state complaint surveys in...well no one can really remember the last one. :) This has renewed my hope in LTC as a whole.

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

I used to say "there are good facilities". I'm not so sure I really believe this any more. Reimbursements aren't keeping up with rising costs of doing business so there is less staff. Good staffing is crucial to good patient care---and more and more of the people we are caring for are patients--very sick people who need more than one nurse for 20 of them. Even the long term residents are getting sicker or more behavioral. People who own most of these places are only interested in making money. I'm glad I'm nearing the end of my career. It's very sad

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Not_A_Hat Person this is mild, it is like you walk into your nightmare, literally, everyday i walk in. OMG does dept of health really not see the issues? Or are these corporate owners/administrators really that slick about covering up all this abuse/issues. Never, in 22 years have i seen a place this poorly run and all about the almighty dollar. Warm body and a pulse!!!

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