Mixed Units

[kemper1974]

Does anyone work on a unit where there are 2 polarly opposite patient populations? I work on a 24 bed OB unit as a primary nursery nurse. We have to capability to have 3 extended transition/special care nursery beds. Everyone works 2 units. Nursery nurses also float to post partum, Labor floats to post partum, and postpartum/gyne nurses have to float to med surg.

The descision was made to take 10 of our beds on one wing and use them for clean ortho surguries, including joint replacements, because the ortho docs wanted their patients to be off the med/surg unit due to the multiple isolations (MRSA/ VRE/h1n1) If OB is full, like it has been this week, the beds revert back to OB. Med/surg is supposed to staff their patients.

In the last month we have lost 6 of our best nurses, and many more have applied elsewhere. Over 50% of our nurses have never worked anywhere but in ob/gyne/nursery, many of them for over 20 years.

Needless to say, we are all scared to death of the "unknown". 2 days of orientation will not be enough to give the ortho patients the care they deserve. We have been told that a "nurse is a nurse is a nurse", but we are truely OB specialists. I might add that the hospital is seeking Magnet status and I do not see how this fits into being a center for nursing excellence.

[PostOpPrincess, BSN, RN]

It doesn't. Not fair to you OB specialists, and certainly not fair to the M/Surg nurses, who are Orthopedic Specialists.

Administration is kuckoo. That's all I can say about it.

And NO--this is NOT magnet material.

[Kiringat]

I can top that!

I work on a digestive medicine/behavioral (detox, alzheimers, prisoners etc.) med/surg floor.

Administration is discussing sending us pediatrics overflow.

Where do they come up with these ideas?

[melsman1904]

Lately on my ortho floor, we've been having a very interesting mix of psych/cardiac/GI/oncology pts to go along with all of our TKR/THR pts. Needless to say, it's been a great learning experience.

[kemper1974]

When this mix was initiated, several hospital employees from other units were worried about the unit having male patients on the floor, even tho they were on the other hallway. Personally, I don't think a male THR/THK is going to jump out of bed to bother the female patients on the other side, I would actually be more worried about the young male "insperminators" and their ahem "celebrating buddies" wandering in to a wrong room.

I think Kiringat wins for the worst mix....prisoners and peds overflow. Yikes.

For the record my first job was ortho-neuro for 8 years as an rn then AHN. I left because they added acute detox to our unit and that was something I did not want to deal with due to personal reasons. Of course back in the 70's our ortho cases consisted of carpel tunnels who stayed 4 days with their arms elevated, laminectomies who were on bedrest for days afterwards, assorted fractures, and we were just starting to do total hips and knees.