nurse

Our straight med/surg nurses take 4 on days, 5 on PMs, and up to 6 on nights. There is some sort of acuity guideline but the hard and fast ratios have been negotiated by the union on our behalf, so management cannot run the ward with less staff than the ratios call for.

WOW...Peds nurse/pt ratio has ALWAYS been less than the adult med/surg. I can tell you THAT's TOO MANY. Our ratio on avg is 5 (Extreme circumstances maybe 6) It has been my exp that the smaller hosp will pile it on you...I worked in one for years & didn't know it could be better. Good luck!!

We do not have peds patients all the time; however when we do have them it does not decrease to workload. our systems seems to be number based. every patient is worth one point unless they are immediate post op or less then 5 years old. However the number of patient and the acuity level are different. up to 8 eight pts with an acuity of 10. What system are other hospitals using to assess the acuity of the patients?

thank you for verifying that 8 is too many. Sometimes I feel like there is something wrong with me, I can not get out on time and given good care. I feel like I have to choose give good care or chart and get out on time.

4-5 on days, up to 6 at night.

California, where I work, has patient ratio laws. The max for peds is 4 patients per nurse, day or night. For adults, it is 4 if they are on any kind of telemetry, otherwise 5.

When I first started working, I had a hard enough time keeping up with 4. After my first year, I had gotten to the point where I could imagine handling a 5th, though I was glad I didn't have to. I cannot imagine dealing with 8, and I would not want to be a nurse, a patient, or a mother of a patient with those kinds of ratios!

I work on a step-down open heart/cardiac unit and our ratio is about 3-4 pts. On a bad night we'll take 5.

i used to work on a tele/med-surg unit straight out of nursing school where I took anywhere from 5-7 patients... it was so crazy, but it really helped me with time management!