Nurses take your breaks! I know some of you are thinking "easier said than done". I am well aware of that. I work on a very busy PCU / Tele floor where 1 patient is going to CT, one has to go surgery, and one of the doctors wants to round with you all at the same time. When I first started I always missed my breakfast break. Now I make it a priority.I have had those days when I have taken my breakfast break at 11:30am and lunch at 4:00pm, that is super late. I very rarely miss my breakfast break, but I will always take my lunch. Once taken, I am a happier me!
If someone has not ate, you have a short-temper and low tolerance for problems. Even if not, your tummy is not happy and neither are you. This makes our job ten times harder, but this is a situation we have some control over. Once you take your break, take your full break. We will always have something to do and never have enough time to do everything. Prioritize patient care and yourself in the mix. Not taking a break will put you at higher risk for burnout syndrome.
TIPS:
Charting--> Don't wait till the end of the day to do all your charting. Chart as you go and as it happens.
Find your break buddy at the start of shift. Yes I live in California, but my facility does not have a special break nurse.
getting water for your patient ---> drink a glass of water also (that's something I have to remember also) :)
Before you think you might take your break --> check all your patient's and give all the PRN if needed --> that way you have a some piece of mind, then run and take your break
It is your responsibility to take your breaks and to take care of yourself. We give all day, so give back to yourself. You are also a priority.
must be nice. I end up signing my people off- and I always come back to hell breaking loose. Bleeding, falling, not toileted. I dont trust anyone to watch my people. they just dont do it.And Im still liable for those pt's outcomes. Its too stressfull.Plus even if I found someone I could trust, they are now watching 12 people on an intermediate stepdown floor. Not good.
100% absolutely correct...I'd rather...and often do...work straight through...let management figure it out! They are so "concerned" about cost??? Hire the correct amount of staff...moot...over...done...
And if I were a patient there and knew that the nurses were sitting at the desks greasing up the computers and monitors, eating while working in the unit, after just having gotten up to clean up bowel movements or something, I'd say something. That's just gross as all hell.
These complaints have been going on for decades. When will nurses unite and demand fair working conditions ?? A national union, where nurses do not work for a hospital as hospitals only seem to know how to take advantage and the nurses allow themselves to be abused. A national run business of some sort that hires and pays nurses so as to eliminate the constant cycle of abuse and licensure risk. Look around your hospitals etc. how many new non nursing departments have been created with those employees getting their breaks and meals. Just a dream I guess but someone must be able to think out of the box. Why do nurses have to be paid by hospitals?
of course thats a different thread( unions) . But look at the recent times- Capitalist america. There has been a reduction of unions in all "trades" . Most businesses are against unions as they cut into the upper crust bonuses and income.
No matter what floor or hospital I've worked at, I've taken at least my 30 minute (sometimes 15-20) break. I eat my lunch and then go back to work. I pass off my pager/phone after checking up on my patients. I know in some settings this may be hard, but you can't take care of patients if you're passed out due to hypoglycemia.
I work in a small community hospital on night shift. We never have more than 6 pts each (average is 5), with two nurses on each station. We get a 30 min non paid lunch and 2 15 min breaks. We are allowed to break them up. Normally I take four 15 min breaks throughout the night, normally around 2200, 0000, 0200, and 0400, but that don't always happen, it just depends on what's going on at the time. I work with a great group of nurses and nurse managers. It also helps that our union rep works nights shift and will stick up for us if needed.
Do people think so little of their profession, they refer back to colleagues with:
-"there's something wrong with you if you don't feel comfortable leaving your patient "
-"You are nasty and dirty for doing that"
- "no one should condone what you are doing, which is enabling your employer to do something illegal, and I have no respect for you."
If you want to "put an end to it", that's not going to do it.
I hate to say it, but eating at a computer at a nurse's station is indeed nasty and dirty - and I'm speaking as someone who's done it in the past. It's gross. However, if that's the best option for the evening, I'd rather see you do that over not eating at all and I'll even help you Cavi wipe the desk afterwards. :) If not before!
There is indeed something wrong if you don't trust your coworkers to watch your patient(s) for even just 15 minutes.
And no one should condone an employer getting away with an illegal act at the expense of its employees. Not one person. In any other professional environment, HR would get involved - even without unions, and I know this because I've seen it. Even the MILITARY says the RNs have to eat!
I'll draw the line at the having no respect comment - but even then, everyone's entitled to an opinion. I will say that making excuses for one's employer promotes an unhealthy, even hostile work environment, where employee is pitted against employer just below the surface and the frustration begins to fester. Not good.
I'll also admit to inward - and sometimes not so inward - eye rolling (yeah, I know, really mature) when others say stuff like that. Oh please. Be an adult, go pee, go eat, and get over it. All that does is literally hold us back as a profession. Ever see a doctor continuously say, "oh, I have no time to pee or eat or take care of myself"? No, you don't. So let's start behaving like the adults we know we are and stop letting hospitals box us into corners. It's 2016.
It does grate on me as well to hear "oh, there's no time", or "oh, I feel awful, but of course I had no time to eat". There's no time in 95% of cases because the choice isn't made to say "I'm sitting down for 30 minutes to eat". People fought like hell in this country to get laws passed that say YOU HAVE TO LET EMPLOYEES EAT if they work over a certain number of hours in a day. No hospital in the US is exempt from US labor law! Yes, there are nights and days where there really ISN'T time. But I refuse to believe that's every single shift.
Not eating, not sitting down, not taking a breather (when you can, and generally speaking, WE ALL CAN) doesn't make us martyrs. It makes us pawns of the employer - and no other industry would put up with that. Why should we?
I'm curious- do those of us who dont get regular breaks also have no representation?
Maybe a survey is in order?
There are laws that say you have to be given them. You're given them. Whether you take them is another matter. But you're only providing free time without pay to your employer if you don't take them.
And I've never been represented by a union.
If an employer were taken to court because they fired an employee over stopping in a 12 hour shift for 30 minutes to eat (assuming, of course, it wasn't in the midst of a code), they'd lose because the American public and the judicial system are far more reasonable than that.
In the OR, you do not leave your patient alone in the room and you are allowed only a few minutes between dropping off one patient and picking up the next. There are no food or drinks in the OR. If no one relieves you for lunch (sometimes they don't), you just continue to work until the room is finished for the day. It's not like you can drink water/ eat a snack while charting or step away from your patient to pee.
I just want to point out that in some specialties it is impossible to go to lunch or take a break when you would like to. If there is not a staff member available to relieve me I cannot leave (leaving is patient abandonment). It has nothing to do with my time management and has everything to do with our staffing numbers. Right now our department is struggling to feed everyone lunch let alone give people breaks. I can absolutely forget a break when I'm called in on call. I chart when I can - when the caca is not hitting the fan. It takes me about 25-30 minutes to chart when I can chart relatively uninterrupted. I *do* clock out *no lunch* when appropriate. I took lunch one day this week after 2pm (I was scheduled 0700-1700) because I gave others lunch first, and helped get an emergency case started before going to lunch.
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malamud69, BSN, RN
575 Posts
100% absolutely correct...I'd rather...and often do...work straight through...let management figure it out! They are so "concerned" about cost??? Hire the correct amount of staff...moot...over...done...