Mrl4963

Point well taken. Thank you for the feedback

Thanks for the replies. Yes, the float stories have been terrible. I’m sure it happens in a lot of places, but icu nurses are viewed as able to work anywhere and we get abused. They will ask nurses to work extra days to fill the needs of icu and then pull icu nurses to other units on the same shift a nurse was asked to work extra. We have been pulled to another unit for their nurses to discharge patients then go home early. They will give icu nurses the sickest patients, give them more patients than their own nurses have, and will give them all of their patients on contact precautions. We have lost several good nurses over it. suggesting little orientation packets for floated nurses, a resource nurse (charge free or discharge coordinator) to be accessible to floated nurses, restrictions on the number of patients, number of contact or incontinent patients, and requesting units to own their complex patients and and complex situations to promote consistency and best possible patient outcomes are among some of the things we are working to achieve

I work in a hospital that is working towards obtaining magnet status and is starting up nursing councils as well as unit based councils. I am a member of my unit based council and am responsible for presenting a document to other unit managers regarding ICU nurses being floated to other units and being treated poorly by staff in those units. I have a list of recommendations to improve the experience of our nurses when being floated yet still providing relief to nurses of those units as well as increasing patient safety. The problem is that I do not know how to structure this document in a professional manner. I’d like for it to be straight forward, easy to see what the problem is, how we can change it and why. Are there any of you who have experience in a unit based council who has ideas on how I should present this? Being a new council, no one in my group has experience in this role.