Nervous About Going From Nights to Days

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Specializes in NICU, Pediatrics, Nursing Education.

Hi. I have worked in a level III NICU for almost 3 years. I did 6 weeks orientation on days, 6 weeks on nights, then stayed on nights ever since. I have made some great friends and really trust my charge nurses. I am in graduate school, so I work weekends. With lecture and clinical during the weekdays, working nights was hard on me last semester. A weekend option day shift position just came available, and it goes to who has seniority that wants it. So, it might not even happen, but I am having a lot of anxiety about leaving nights. Any advice?

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I'm curious, is this a 12 hour day shift weekend option? I did a 16 hour day/evening weekend option in a SNF for a year and a half while in a full time RN-BSN program and loved it. I'm on 12 hour nights now and miss having those 5 days off.

I don't have any advice, I was just stoked to hear that there are still weekend option hospital deals out there. I'm in Baltimore now and have only heard of one area hospital offering 12 hour weekend options. I am looking to move to Portland Oregon and that would be ideal for me. However, I am positive that grad school is much more rigorous than anything I have ever done, so it is definitely a big decision to make. I wish you the best and good luck with whatever you choose!

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Specializes in NICU, Pediatrics, Nursing Education.

Sorry I am a year late replying to your post. Grad school sort of stole my life for the last year! I ended up staying on nights and not taking the day weekend option position. Actually, at my hospital, they do not offer weekend option anymore. It would have been 12 hour shifts, btw. The economy in my area got really horrendous in 2010 and forced the hospitals to decrease the number of nurses on weekend option (both AM and PM shifts). Now, they only replace the weekend option slots when they absolutely have to... so just because a nurse leaves weekend option does not necessarily mean they will fill the position right away. There are no new weekend option positions being created currently. Basically, they let the weekenders suffer with low staffing until it gets so bad that someone threatens to report it as a patient safety issue. Then they will hire a couple of currently employed RNs into those weekend option positions. I think they would like to get rid of weekend option altogether and make everyone work every other weekend... but the RNs in my unit would literally revolt. I don't expect to see weekend option come back at my hospital in a really long time, if ever. :-(

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