I smell something rotten.

Nurses Disabilities

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I had been working full-time at a LTC, and I really liked it! That is until my health took a nose dive and I had to take leave back in April. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia with small fiber neuropathy. I also had extreme muscle weakness and was dropping things and tripping. The facility had been great, kept me on as PRN by allowing me to attend staff meetings at least once a month. I kept hearing "I can't wait for you to come back", "When are you coming back". Well, now I'm doing a lot better and I'm ready to come back....but, and you know there was going to be a but. I went and talked to the DON and 2 of the ADONs about me returning last Friday. I got this funny feeling that they had been rehearsing their answer before I had gotten there. My ADON looked over to the DON and said that there wasn't anything full-time or part-time they could offer me right now. Funny, because their website says otherwise. I check it before I went in. I pressed them a little harder, saying I needed to get back to work and they said I could come in a few hours a week and do filing and be put on their PRN list for the hall. I was very upset. You see, I'm an RN, BSN and all of the floor nurses are LVNs. I don't care one bit about it, but the people that pay us might, as they pay for RNs is way more than LVNs. So I'm guessing that the powers that be do not want to put a RN back on the floor and pay her for the same work a LVN is doing. Fine, I understand that. So why not just tell me that. Why keep me hanging on if there really is no way for me to work there on a permeant basis? I feel like they think they have a RN in their back pocket that they can pull out whenever the need may arise. This may or may not be true, but it has me fired up. Now I'm job hunting, but I'm worried that starting a new job with my unpredictable health could be a recipe for disaster. My current job saw the onset and know what happened, but a new place would have no idea. I feel like I'm stuck in limbo. And I feel betrayed by my job, a job I thought I was going to be able to come back to (I live in a small town, so yes, this is a realistic expectation). What a bad place to be in!

Specializes in Infusion Nursing, Home Health Infusion.

I don't what state you are in but that may have been in your best interest to allow them to put you on a prn status. Did you meet the qualifications for FMLA? It applies only to employees who work at companies with at least 50 workers (workers must work within 75 miles of each other). Also, employees can take FMLA leave only if they worked at least a year for an employer and worked at least 1,250 hours for that employer last year. You may also have other rights based upon what state you are and also what right you have under the ADA in but generally speaking it is more difficult to fire someone solely because they are on disability especially when they are protected under FMLA and the ADA. You may have shot yourself in the foot and lost all of your protections

That may have been their plan all along or at least after they figured out they could manage without you! So they want to keep you on a prn status and hope you will now leave on your own so they do not have to deal with any potential lawsuits. It's always better to get an employee to leave on their own,even in, "at will" states. Why are you expecting them to be upfront with you. Their concern is the bottom line,not you! Sad but true so your bottom line is to see the writing on the wall and get the heck out of there and keep your plans to yourself! You may just want to work those promised hours until you can get another job.

So now you should seek other employment and please keep your health problems to yourself. Only reveal what you legally must! You have a chronic disease that now must be managed and lots of RNs work with chronic illnesses and I am one of them! You must mange it well and do not take on more than you can handle. You also must learn about FMLA, ADA and your states laws so you can use them when you need them. If you need any reasonable accommodations I would wait (if you physically can)until after I was hired and had established a good reputation and demonstrated a good work ethic.

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