personal cell phone and the internet and impact on staff moral

[24 yrs and counting]

OK I am a fist time blogger so I have a question for the nursing population at large, I am a icu nurse in a large treahing hospital. I see a distubing trend in our icu and am wondering if this is happing all over. I see staff using personal cell phones for personal calls durirng there working hours, texting durring teaching rounds. This looks poor and very unprofessional. Also we see alot on staff on the pc, using it for face book personal shopping, twitter, taking up alot of time that should be spent with patients. Then the offending staff person is the first to ask for help when they have not gotten there work done. I have addressed this issue with my mannager and she doesn't see it as a issue. The rest of the staff is just as upset over this increasing trend in our icu. The rest of us have had it with the offending nurses. To add to this mix also is an ethical issue many nurse use face book add informantion about patients in the icu, no names are given but if you work in the unit and are on face book you know who the patient is. God help them I'm sure this is against heppa regulations. Any one running into thess issues and have you been able to cle ar them up?

[NinA 56]

O mine!! most ICu units do not allow cell phone usage in the immediate area I thought due to possible interference with monitors, also placing information on face book about pts can and is a HIPAA issue , as a matter of fact I thought that I recently read an article concerning the firing of a nurse for placing information on facebook about a patient ,is there anyone else who read that story?

[Rexie68]

most icu units do not allow cell phone usage in the immediate area i thought due to possible interference with monitors,

i'm guessing it was the old, analog cell phones that interfered with things, because our icus issue cell phones to the nurses for their shifts.

[Flipper911]

I do not see a problem with cell phone usage among staff that are responsible. Take away cell phone and some staff will be on the land lines or breaking every twn minutes. The blame does not lie with the phone but with the behavior.

My current hospital everyone has their phone. I see more texting than actually talking on the phone and this includes nurses, residents and attendings. The work gets done and it is a non issue. \

I have worked many hospitals where cell phones were used and really have not seen a negative impact from the use - outside a horrid ringtone now and then.

[NinA 56]

i'm guessing it was the old, analog cell phones that interfered with things, because our icus issue cell phones to the nurses for their shifts.

:twocents:ok thank you for that information your right the nurses do have cell phones now

[HNELLA]

we text our docs non urgent info. It is a lot quicker and less intrusive than calling them. A few are on record and preferring to be called but the majority prefer the texts.

[AggieNurse2B]

Our clinical instructors use texting to tell us what time to meet for lunch, post conference, or if they need to find us for some reason. It's also pretty handy when we need our instructor for something. Often, we're required to either have the clinical instructor with us when performing a specific procedure or have permission from them to perform it with our assigned RN for the day. It's much more efficient to text them and tell them what room you're in/going to be in, rather than run all over the floor looking for them.

Maybe it's because we're students and are scared to death of doing something wrong, but I've never seen another student abuse their privilege of carrying their phones (on vibrate) in their pockets. Admittedly, I have seen regular staff using them for personal stuff, but it actually has been pretty rare.

I don't have a lot of experience in nursing, per se, but this is a second career for me. In my first career, I often found that people responded better to management giving them some latitude in making appropriate choices, rather than mandating blanket rules from an ivory tower. Just my 2 cents...

[24 yrs and counting]

I totally understanding texting nursing instructors, and Md's along with other health professionals in the context of patient care what I am talking about is personal use, texting hrs not minutes, interfering with pt care, hrs on the pc shopping, looking at wedding pictures, face booK, I understand the use of cells in the hosptial I use one when traveling with one of our unit patients especially when we are in ct, mri, and things go wrong. What I am talking about it not anti phone or internet but the issue is nurse abuse of them for personal reasons, which intern has a huge inpact on morale and pt care.