Offered a job in HH but I'm not sure about this one.

Specialties Home Health

Published

A quick background: I ended up resigning from my job as a M/S nurse last August (and did not go through with another job offer) because I became pregnant and wanted to focus on my kids and finish my BSN. It's been awesome not having to worry about work for nearly the past year! I did a semester and have taken off a little time to care for my baby.

Recently my husband and I have decided we want to relocate within the next 18 months or so. I figured it would be good if I worked here and there to help save money to make things easier. I was recently offered a position as a HH nurse per diem. This is so new to me and I'm worried about being taken advantage of. I negotiated no call ever, and I was told I could schedule myself for as few as 1 day a month.

Wanting to work weekends only, I found out I'd be the only nurse covering the entire west side of the city and west suburbs. That's a pretty extensive area. Also they do not pay mileage reimbursement but $5 per visit towards that. The pay is $45/visit and $125/SOC. No phone, tablet, laptop is provided but I was told a "stipend" (didn't say how much) would be offered after 60-90 days. Finally, I was told I could "shadow" someone during weekdays to train. I'm worried about not being adequately trained before being let out on my own.

My gut tells me this isn't a good setup but lacking any HH experience I'm not sure. Any insight is appreciated!

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Too much investment on your part to only work "here and there". You would have substantially less investment of time, effort, money (to run your car into the ground) on your part if you were to go to an extended care assignment. One trip to one shift. Routine care to a stable patient, for anywhere from four to as many as sixteen hours per shift. You can work as many or as few shifts per pay period as you care to. You do your note while on shift and that is that. No coordinating or hours spent doing charting while at home. Just a better fit for the situation you describe. If this agency does not offer extended care, then look at another agency. Some agencies offer both extended care and visit work, others only one or the other.

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Too much investment on your part to only work "here and there". You would have substantially less investment of time, effort, money (to run your car into the ground) on your part if you were to go to an extended care assignment. One trip to one shift. Routine care to a stable patient, for anywhere from four to as many as sixteen hours per shift. You can work as many or as few shifts per pay period as you care to. You do your note while on shift and that is that. No coordinating or hours spent doing charting while at home. Just a better fit for the situation you describe. If this agency does not offer extended care, then look at another agency. Some agencies offer both extended care and visit work, others only one or the other.

This particular agency doesn't have extended care but that may be something worth checking into for my situation. I've read about the charting in HH sometimes taking a significant amount of time as you mentioned, so that's also a consideration. Thanks for responding!

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This does not sound good at all. How are you expected to chart without a laptop? The territory may not be so bad if you can schedule everyone in a row but there are so many other red flags. A lot of VNA's throw the nurses out there with a sink or swim, I'd run. There are better ones out there.

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This does not sound good at all. How are you expected to chart without a laptop? The territory may not be so bad if you can schedule everyone in a row but there are so many other red flags. A lot of VNA's throw the nurses out there with a sink or swim, I'd run. There are better ones out there.

Judging from the disorganized interview I totally got the feeling that everything I was told would go out the window and I'd be hung out to dry on my own. The outer edge of part of the area that I would be covering is scary in the daytime and heavily drug infested. I'd be very worried doing any visits in that area and being the only nurse covering the entire west side of town I'd have no choice. My safety is first and since I'd have no one to go with me and I'd feel very uncomfortable having my husband wait in the car for me in those areas, I won't take this job. Fortunately I applied for another PRN job this time at a different (and hopefully better) hospital about 15 minutes from my house and I got a call for an interview next week. I'd still love to try HH nursing so I'll keep looking.

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They won't even provide a laptop? That alone would alarm me. I work on a tablet that has been provided; there are a lot of HIPAA-related reasons for the agency to have ownership of the device. After years of 7am shifts I really prefer HH. I work per diem so I work as much or as little as I want. I am sure you can find a job in HH for an agency that has its act together; this one clearly does not.

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They won't even provide a laptop? That alone would alarm me. I work on a tablet that has been provided; there are a lot of HIPAA-related reasons for the agency to have ownership of the device. After years of 7am shifts I really prefer HH. I work per diem so I work as much or as little as I want. I am sure you can find a job in HH for an agency that has its act together; this one clearly does not.

The flexibility of per diem HH nursing really appeals to me. I've always been hesitant to try HH and this experience really spoiled it for me. I called another HH company a few months ago but the per visit pay was low to me and they also didn't provide mileage. It kind of makes me question the HH agencies in my area. At any rate I was offered the job at the hospital and only need to do 4 shifts a month. The pay is very competitive so I accepted the offer.

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The flexibility of per diem HH nursing really appeals to me. I've always been hesitant to try HH and this experience really spoiled it for me. I called another HH company a few months ago but the per visit pay was low to me and they also didn't provide mileage. It kind of makes me question the HH agencies in my area. At any rate I was offered the job at the hospital and only need to do 4 shifts a month. The pay is very competitive so I accepted the offer.
Sounds like you made the right choice for you. 4 shifts per month is certainly doable. I'm pretty fortunate in that my agency is near where I live, as is the territory and there are no dangerous areas. The pay is more than I made on shift work, except when it comes to admissions which can be ridiculously time-consuming.
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