No Charge Nurse?

[~nurselissa~]

Does your unit have a charge nurse? If not who covers the LPN's. We have no ANM and the manager is thinking of have one charge nurse M-F 8-4:30, any ideas of what to do between when the time the night shift charge leaves at 6am until 8 am? Or from 4:30 until the night shift charge gets there at 6pm? Who would assign beds, cover the LPN etc?

Thanks

ann

[TrudyRN]

Does your unit have a charge nurse? If not who covers the LPN's. We have no ANM and the manager is thinking of have one charge nurse M-F 8-4:30, any ideas of what to do between when the time the night shift charge leaves at 6am until 8 am? Or from 4:30 until the night shift charge gets there at 6pm? Who would assign beds, cover the LPN etc?

Thanks

ann

Ha ha, well, unless you have a House Supervisor, probably whoever the only RN in the facility is, without pay, without extra time to do your own work + the things you mention. It's called economics, Lissa, and you are the sacrifice. What does your boss say when you ask? I mean no harm, I just don't know what else the boss could be thinking except money.

[Mulan]

Well if you're on a small unit that only has one RN and one LPN, and no charge nurse, then you're it.

Good luck!

[Nursing2Travel]

We have no charge nurses anywhere in our hospital. We generally have more RNs than LPNs working, and each of us are in charge of 1-3 (sometimes more, unfortunately!) LPN patients. This works well with our more independent LPNs and is a burden with LPNs who are less independent. I've not ever worked with a charge nurse, actually.