Opinions, Is this illegal?

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ok fellow homecare nurses--- does this seem wrong to you?

i was hired as a 40 hour per week salaried employee.... recently, our company was bought out and we are now paid per visit.. our census has plummetted and i have had appx. 12-15 revisits per week (for the past two months). in the past, our 40 hour salary was based on 30 revisits, which is fulltime, and of course 12-15 is hardly even part time pay. however, administration has told the full-time employees that although we are paid per visit, we were told- verbatim--, ' we own you for 8 hours a day regardless of the fact that you are only getting paid per visit."

so basically, i have 2-3 revisits per day but im sitting around from 8-430 monday thru friday because 'those are the rules.'

is this illegal? i have to be 'available' to them for 8 hours per day when im getting paid for 2 hours?? its not like we are even making on-call pay!! help!!??!!?

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You need to make a visit to the Labor Board and deal with this. Your two other options are to put up with it (not advised) or to just find another job. Definitely illegal labor practices. I would leave.

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FYI--- this company is AMEDISYS!! thanks for your response!!

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Thanks for the heads up. This company has appeared in my former home town. I now know to stay away from them.

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Specializes in oncology, trauma, home health.

That sounds like Amedisys...I was paid hourly by them but was told we were the only agency in the U.S. who was.

They are a monster and desperate to conquer the home health industry.

In answer to your question, no that's wrong. WHat about all of the on-line stuff you can do from your computer at home? We became union so as not to go to pay per visit but were told it would be $75 per admission! Admissions take about 3 hours work total, the math does not add up.

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Specializes in Home Health.

I can tell you that I wouldn't work in the environment that you are in. If you want me for 8 hrs, then you pay me for 8 hrs otherwise my time is my own. The agency that I work for is really small, but we have nurses that are salaried and they are on call during business hours regardless of how many pts they have and we have nurses that are per visit and all they do is their visits and then they go home. I'm the only nurse that is hourly at my agency, but I take all the after hour call-outs and weekend SOC et ROCs.

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"although we are paid per visit, we were told- verbatim--, ' we own you for 8 hours a day regardless of the fact that you are only getting paid per visit.""

well! when my director came back from florida several wks ago after a big director's meeting she had a meeting with the entire office and stated the same thing. i thought she was just having a bad day, or directing her comments to the many to get the point to a few but i guess i was wrong. :uhoh21:

i am so busy with my day usually that i don't have a problem getting in my 8 hours. in fact my hours would run more to 10+. this is because we have so little help. no one will stay. we have a few like me that has been there for years, from back before it was amedisys. but for the most part, when we get a new nurse, they leave for 2 reasons--worked to death cause we are so busy and as i saw in a previous post amedisys micromanages everything!.

another thing i wonder about being per visit is the fact that while you are busy sitting charting and faxing and such, that is your own time having been built into the per visit rate.

and while i'm at it...if i have to hear about the proverbial bus one more time, i think i'm gonna :banghead:

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I have read this story before, as well as this link..http://www.citronresearch.com/index.php/2008/08/12/seeking-healthy-returns-in-amedisys-nasdaqamed.

I can say that I have felt pressure to change my oasis answers to reflect a different score. I have received requests to look at my answers and to " think about them in a different way" but I feel that I was the one that was in the patient home, it's my answer and I'm not changing it. It's always been wrapped in "what about this" or "do you feel that this patient can safely do this if you picked this answer" so I can see how someone without many years could question themselves.

Home health has always been about the wording. Word it one way, not billable. The other way--passes. There is a fine line and it's hard to stay on this side of it so I can see where newer nurses could wobble all over the line unintentionally.

I could go on....

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Specializes in Med/Surg, OB, Home Health/Hospice.

You'd be better off as a greeter at Walmart! At least you'd make minimum wage!!

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:nono:

Hello:

I am new to this forum but a friend of mine sent this to me because I work for Amedisys. I am very worried because on more than one occassion I have admitted pt's to home health services that are not home bound......when I complained for being sent to a home of a non-home bound pt and wasting my time I was told that I am not a team player and that I do not promote the company. I admitted a pt today who was busy all day preparing a dinner for her Son and his family and a few others. I think there were 15 total people coming to her home for dinner. She was not even aware that she was being admitted for home health. She had seen her Dr about 3 weeks ago and our sales rep talked to him about getting her onto home health services. We are seeing her husband too for something that he is also not home bound for...he went out to the grocery store while I was there so she could make her world famous eggplant cassarole. They are a nice couple and they are both scratching their heads as to why we are coming to there home for these services. He wanted to go to the local out-pt clinic for PT and Anodyne therapy. The part on the 485 that states why the pt is home bound is filled out with the following statement: "Pt is not able to leave home without a taxing effort." What a crock!!!

They do pay well but I sure don't want any part of this anymore...I have been sucked-in enough. I would guess that at least 1/3 of our pt's are not really home bound. It's all about numbers and quotas. I was told that this pt today must be admitted so that we can make our quota and be on the "Presidents List" yet again. We even have a nurse who sits in the office and makes "sunshine calls" to previous pt's and if they say they don't feel well she calls their Dr and gets orders for home health services. How many times can we teach diabetic care or what HTN is or CHF, COPD???? Is there not a cut off for how many times a pt can have physical therapy or education from a home health service??? Needless to say I am looking for another job. I just hope I don't go to jail first. I am afraid that the current Directer will give me a bad reference if I complain more...so I am keeping it cool until I get the heck out of there.

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This is the problem with all the for profit companies taking over home health. It is going to get worse. It is so hard to make a profit that companies who only care about profit are being forced to have questionable practices. I am thinking of getting out of home care because of it.

As to the original question- are you getting benefits? Being treated like a full timer even if there are not enough patients? If so, then maybe they do own you for 40 hours. You need to be available to take cases that might come up. It sucks, but they may have you over a barrel. This is why I am completely against pay per visit. I have argued against it for years.

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