Our unit is getting ready to insitute a mandatory overtime policy. We are supposed to have meetings this week for our feedback.
In my situation, I work 3 - 12 hour nights and that's all I can work mentally, physically and logistically. Anything more will accelerate the rate at which I will experience burnout. I have a small child and plan on another very soon. Also, I think nights are different from days in that the recooperation time from day sleep to nighttime sleep takes longer. I am very distressed about this.
Does your unit have a similar policy? How have you coped?
I tell the supervisor, "I would if I could, but I can't because I am too fatigued to provide safe care."
Once she told me I had no choice. I wrote, "I told ***** that I am fatigued thererore any accident, error, or lack of complete charting is not my responsibility. I will do the best I can.
Please sign here so I will have this if called in to court or for discipline."
She told me to go home. I have been asked but never again have they tried to force me to work overtime.
Years ago I read in the paper that a nurse called Child Protective Services to report that her kids would be home alone because her employer wouldn't let her go home after her shift. CPS called the hospital and told them to let that mother go home.
I tell the supervisor, "I would if I could, but I can't because I am too fatigued to provide safe care."
Once she told me I had no choice. I wrote, "I told ***** that I am fatigued thererore any accident, error, or lack of complete charting is not my responsibility. I will do the best I can.
Please sign here so I will have this if called in to court or for discipline."
She told me to go home. I have been asked but never again have they tried to force me to work overtime.
Years ago I read in the paper that a nurse called Child Protective Services to report that her kids would be home alone because her employer wouldn't let her go home after her shift. CPS called the hospital and told them to let that mother go home.
Years ago I read in the paper that a nurse called Child Protective Services to report that her kids would be home alone because her employer wouldn't let her go home after her shift. CPS called the hospital and told them to let that mother go home.
My state recently instituted a law that RNs and CNAs cannot be forced to do mandatory overtime-it takes effect next month. No thanks to our governor who vetoed it:down:-the state legislature overrode the veto, YAY!!
Our nurses union was intrumental in seeing this law come to fruition..obviously in the case of a disaster or something, it wouldn't apply.
My state recently instituted a law that RNs and CNAs cannot be forced to do mandatory overtime-it takes effect next month. No thanks to our governor who vetoed it:down:-the state legislature overrode the veto, YAY!!
Our nurses union was intrumental in seeing this law come to fruition..obviously in the case of a disaster or something, it wouldn't apply.
Nursing is a huge potential voting block, if we'd just get our act together and use it to our advantage.
I'll be interested in how hospitals react to this; wouldn't be surprised to see new policies re-defining 'internal disasters' to include short-staffing.
My state recently instituted a law that RNs and CNAs cannot be forced to do mandatory overtime-it takes effect next month. No thanks to our governor who vetoed it:down:-the state legislature overrode the veto, YAY!!
Our nurses union was intrumental in seeing this law come to fruition..obviously in the case of a disaster or something, it wouldn't apply.
We don't yet have a ban on mandatory overtime. Most of our contracts do have language requiring that overtime must be voluntary. Our Labor Code does have excellent overtime regulations with penalties for missed breaks and 1 1/2 or double time for over 8 and 12 hours respectively.
Our nurse staffing regulations:
"...The hospital shall plan for routine fluctuations in patient census.
If a healthcare emergency causes a change in the number of patients on a unit, the hospital must demonstrate that prompt efforts were made to maintain required staffing levels.
A healthcare emergency is defined for this purpose as an unpredictable or unavoidable occurrence at unscheduled or unpredictable intervals relating to healthcare delivery requiring immediate medical interventions and care..."
If you are unable to work more than your regular time, you may consider looking for another position. Just curious...does this mandatory overtime also apply to managers? I find it interesting that hospitals ignore the fact that managers and nursing administrators have RN licenses and can pitch in and help out when there is short staffing. They may be a bit rusty but there are many things these nurses can help the bedside nurses do!
Specializes in LTC/SNF, Psychiatric, Pharmaceutical.
Our unit is getting ready to insitute a mandatory overtime policy. We are supposed to have meetings this week for our feedback.
In my situation, I work 3 - 12 hour nights and that's all I can work mentally, physically and logistically. Anything more will accelerate the rate at which I will experience burnout. I have a small child and plan on another very soon. Also, I think nights are different from days in that the recooperation time from day sleep to nighttime sleep takes longer. I am very distressed about this.
Does your unit have a similar policy? How have you coped?
Look for another job. Mandatory overtime is an unacceptable answer. You are not an indentured servant to your facility, you have the right to time away from it - you are, after all, working to support your life away from the facility. You are NOT giving your life to the hospital.
This kind of policy is unnecessary. The hospital can post a list of shifts needing coverage, offer an incentive (an extra $2-5 an hour) for people to VOLUNTARILY work overtime. This works. Coercion should never be an answer. Eventually, I suppose, they will get the idea that correcting the conditions that caused the shortage to start with may just solve the shortage, but for right now, that's too dangerous and revolutionary of an idea. Heresy!
Moreover, there is mounting evidence that working >40hours a week, or >10 hours a day for that matter, increases the number of errors made by exhausted nurses. And your hospital is going to throw you to the wolves if that happens. There is no way their legal department is going to admit any culpability on the hospital's part d/t dangerous policies.
"Feedback," eh. What do you want to bet that the hospital administration will actually listen to any constructive feedback pointing out the drawbacks of mandatory overtime to patient care? The only thing that is going to change Administration's mind is the threat of a mass exodus.
Over the past few months, my unit has offered people to sign up for extra shifts for double time. Even so, we were still short staffed, thus the reason for mandatory overtime now. I never signed up for double time because I was just so exhausted working my normal schedule.
I am still relatively new, so I still have a year and some change left on my contract before I can leave or I will have to pay back my scholarship to the hospital. I also have about 6 months left on my state scholarship.
How can I find out what NC's policies are re: mandatory overtime? I checked out the NCNA website, but didn't find anything.
At my last job, each unit was "autonomous" meaning you didn't have to float, and you had to staff your own unit on your own..... So we were required to sign up for 1-3 call shifts in a 6 week schedule once the staffing tracks were assessed for numbers. You could be called in for one or all three depending on unit needs. They also had a shift auction program, where extra +call shifts were posted on the computer, and employees could "bid" on them. The lowest hourly rate bidder won the shift. Bids started at $48/hr plus half of your hourly rate if it was your 4th shift that week. It was VERY good money for the area (south) It all but eliminated the need for travelers in our hospital. We actually had people fiercely bidding each other down.
Where I work now, it is a large unionized hospital, and we are not required to work mandatory overtime per our contract.
pickledpepperRN
4,491 Posts
I tell the supervisor, "I would if I could, but I can't because I am too fatigued to provide safe care."
Once she told me I had no choice. I wrote, "I told ***** that I am fatigued thererore any accident, error, or lack of complete charting is not my responsibility. I will do the best I can.
Please sign here so I will have this if called in to court or for discipline."
She told me to go home. I have been asked but never again have they tried to force me to work overtime.
Years ago I read in the paper that a nurse called Child Protective Services to report that her kids would be home alone because her employer wouldn't let her go home after her shift. CPS called the hospital and told them to let that mother go home.