I need a little advice. I am a new graduate nurse working in the ICU. I just got off orientation a few weeks ago and have realized, to my utter amazement, that I'm pretty competent and not going to get anyone killed. I've also realized that my unit won't give me inappropriate assignments if they can help it, so a lot of my anxiety has been relieved.
I was orientated on days, but my real idea is to work nights. I've wanted to work nights ever since nursing school! I naturally lead a nocturnal lifestyle, and I usually stay up until 4-5AM on the nights I don't work during the day. I think that it would be a good fit for me. I have a few problems I need some advice on.
#1. There is more support during the day. We have a unit educator and a whole bunch of managing critical care teams of residents that are always on the floor. If there's an emergency, it's pretty easy to get a room filled with doctors in short notice. There's also more management around. Not to mention I've formed bonds with most of the day-shift nurses and can rely on most of them.
#2. My unit currently has a shortage on days. One of the night nurses recently went to work somewhere else and didn't like it. She asked to be put back on our unit and they made an arrangement with her that she'd have to work days until the staffing issues are resolved, then they'd put her back on nights. Therefore I'm not sure if they'd even consider hiring me for nights. I'm really nervous to talk to anyone about it because I don't want to appear ungrateful or seem like a deserter.
And lastly, I hear that night shift nurses don't help each other out as much. I'm sure this isn't the case everywhere, but I remember giving report to one nurse and helping her reposition the patient only to realize she'd already done most of it herself. She told me "when you work nights, you learn to do things on your own." Is that true?
I guess those are all my questions. Any advice as to how or when I should explore the option of going to nights would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for the responses guys, this is very encouraging! I am very much a team player and always stop to help someone when they're swamped or looking haggard. I even help the residents put in their orders on our online charting system
So I think I would be a great addition to the night shift brigade. I have been working in my position for five months if you factor in my orientation. Do you guys think I should wait for 6 months on my own before trying out nights?
To be completely honest, I haven't even considered the differentials. I'm more focused on the hours. Waking up at 0545 will put me in an early grave. I'm just not hardwired that way. And on my days off I naturally start shifting back to a night shift schedule and usually watch the sun rise bitterly on my third day off!
As far as there being less families and guests, I can see how that could be a positive. But a big allure for me is the diminished stress or sense of urgency. I'm sure things get spicy when there's a code or a herniation though!
I worked nights my first year out of school and still pick up shifts once in a while. I never noticed any difference in the amount of work between days and nights. As they say, nursing is a 24-hour job. There are fewer random new orders at night, but then we had all the scheduled blood draws. There are fewer visitors, but sometimes visitors can be helpful in caring for the patient, or even in keeping them occupied. When I oriented on days, I never thought it was fair that night shift didn't have to deal with any meals, but on nights, I feel like I'm constantly running to fetch snacks for someone or another, something I rarely did on days. And BID dressing changes (or whatever) happen on both shifts. My biggest reason for preferring nights: no discharges! You do still have to deal with new admits, but not as many as on days, and you don't have to deal with the mess of processing a discharged just to turn around and have to process a new admit.
My advice: Try to pick up a couple of shifts on nights and see for yourself how you like it. No one will think you're ungrateful if you let your manager know that you are interesting in moving to nights when an opening comes up.
Nights in my experience, tended to run one of two ways:
1) Things were routine and chill, and there was some serious downtime.
2) Things were off the hook and crazy, and you are chasing your tail all night because of the lack of resources that days had (supervisors who helped out, extra ancillary staff, your RT only having a unit or 2 and not be spread out too thin)
It's hard to judge the culture of a shift from someone who doesn't work the shift.
OTOH, after 3 years nights made me a raving lunatic. But that may have had something to do with a small child as well.
I've worked nights for 4 years now. It's another dynamic. everyone comes together to get lights, help each other out, for the good of our patients. You learn how to do things and make your lives as easy as possible...sometimes management be damned.
I love working weekends b/c the supervisors aren't there and MDs aren't calling. I mean I enjoy the help from the higher ups but I like being able to do my job w/out a bunch of interupptions! So that's why I think nights would be better than you realize!
Also you could always put in for nights that way they know your preference.
Right now I'm working days and I really enjoy it even though my preference is evenings, I worked evenings for years so my body is very much adjusted to evenings. I work in a nursing home and we only have 3 nurses per shift so I will know if an evening is going to open up and I'll put in for evenings if/when one opens up depending upon how soon (b/c if it's when my daughter starts school then I'd stay on days so I could see her more frequently)
On days there are more people and I was constantly trying to grab a chair to sit in to chart, or a phone to make a call. Some days I literally had to go to the other nurses station to do so. Doctors, PT, OT or others were constantly taking my chart when I needed it. Visitors were in and out, and the powers that B were everywhere as well as Drs, PA's etc.
On nights we don't deal with meals which means less DFS, and insulin covers. I have one and day shift has 3. Typically we don't schedule dressing changes on the night shift, but on occasion I do have to do one. It's still much better than 5 or 6 patients a day. Once a week day shift has schedule Central line dressing changes. Again this is something I have to do occasionally if a pt messes theirs up, but not 5-6 at a time. We don't discharge people at night. Patients aren't going to CT, MRI, etc at night so that's less paperwork and confusion. There are usually not Drs writing new orders unless its a new admit.
I do have 4am blood draws on patients with central lines, but that generally only one or two patients, and sometimes none. For patients with Foley's who have an order to DC they come out at 6am, but the Tech does that.
Occasionally you have a patient or two that you pass out meds, get their pain treated, turn out their light, and they actually go to sleep for the night. Every once in a while you will have a few of those which allows you to get your charting done. That being said occasionally you have none of those, and are running your tail off all night.
I have noticed that even RRT's and emergency situations feel different. During the day if someone calls an RRT (Rapid response) you have no less than 20 people in the room. The manager is there, the charge nurse, respiratory, every nurse on the floor. Everybody is OMG, stress, and drama. It's almost like everyone wants to be involved and are aware that the powers that be are watching. They want to get in there and perform unless of course things aren't going well, and then it's whose the nurse for this patient. We had an RRT the other night (night shift). It was respiratory, the charge, and 3 nurses. Everybody was calm, and dealt with it, stabilized the patient, and went back to work.
So 5 months after I made my original post, I'm finally on nights! I'm absolutely loving it. A lot has changed over 5 months and I feel so much better about my role as a nurse and my ability to handle situations.
I love the night shift so much. So far it's been quiet, less stressful, and really intimate. All of the night nurses are insanely helpful, I'm so used to doing everything on my own on days. But they are always asking me if I need help and giving me advice on scheduling all of my AM labs and repeat scans.
I worked dayshift on a busy high level aquity stepdown IICU. It was extremely busy. Then I moved to nights. Yes, it is quieter and there is not as many people around. It is a whole different atmsophere. My coworkers were awesome. The issue was that if you need help you have to ask for help. No one volunteered to help you. I can work either shift. Good luck.
MeTheRN, BSN, MSN, RN
228 Posts
Thanks for the responses guys, this is very encouraging! I am very much a team player and always stop to help someone when they're swamped or looking haggard. I even help the residents put in their orders on our online charting system
So I think I would be a great addition to the night shift brigade. I have been working in my position for five months if you factor in my orientation. Do you guys think I should wait for 6 months on my own before trying out nights?
To be completely honest, I haven't even considered the differentials. I'm more focused on the hours. Waking up at 0545 will put me in an early grave. I'm just not hardwired that way. And on my days off I naturally start shifting back to a night shift schedule and usually watch the sun rise bitterly on my third day off!
As far as there being less families and guests, I can see how that could be a positive. But a big allure for me is the diminished stress or sense of urgency. I'm sure things get spicy when there's a code or a herniation though!