Multiple nurse schedules

[kampnurse817]

For the first time out of my five years at camp, I will have three other nurses with me. I am the Health Director. Since I hae always done everything myself, I was wondering what kind of schedule the other camps come up with so that everything gets done and everyone gets time off. The two main med times in the morning and at night, all four of us will need to do, but during the day, I need some guidance on. I have never worked as a supervisor before, and need some advice.

[Alex Egan, LPN, EMT-B]

Question one. How many nurses do you have exactly? Also if you NEED all hands for oth med passes is anyone getting a day off? My camp has six nurses, plus two part timers. So we have a little more leeway with the schedule. However our solution was to have a swing shift to cover the busy time. So while two nurses are on the 7-3 and 3-11 shift one nurse works 0900-1300 and then returns for 1700-2100. This nurse is in the clinic for clinic call. We had a staff shortage and had to go down to one nurse passing mess for evening. We found that evening meds were much lighter than am meds, usually just antibiotics and eye gtts. Perhapse you can do a similar schedule with one 7-3 one 3-11 and two swing around your peek med/ visit times. Of course rotating the positions amount staff.

[kampnurse817]

The first two weeks when the extra nurses will be there, we have disabled adults coming. They have so many meds and they take so long to do, that we have to have two nurses giving meds to one camper. Long story - they had some problems during the years I was not there with med errors. So, it takes all four nurses to administer meds to two people at a time. I just don't have experience in supervising and I will be in charge - I just want to be prepared.