hollyvk

Another option is to report the situation to the state agency that licenses the home care agency. They certainly will want to know about the agency putting the client's health at risk.

Oh please NO! (Quit nursing and do law school). That is NOT the road to riches (and I would know, having done that). There are too many attorneys in the US competing for too few jobs, compared to the ever expanding need for more nurses. But specialties where you can make $100K plus--look at Medical Informatics. In the hospital, it's working with the clinicians and IT staffs to make the best use of the electronic medical record software. Beyond the hospital, it's working with the software vendors and support companies. I've worked in this area for 15 years and love it--I'm never bored, I get great benefits and salary, and I'm not stressed at work. And if you want to see info on salaries, go to Glassdoor. com (https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/index.htm) and do a search for the location and job title to start (you can add # of years of experience, size of employer).

Nursing Informatics focuses generally on hospital-based EHR work, mainly assisting staff with how to work with the EHR system the hospital uses. Hence knowing how EPIC, Meditech or Allscripts software works is a big plus. And if you don't want to work for a hospital, then consider looking into working for one of the EHR software vendors. But there are jobs well beyond those two realms. The software vendors rely on other companies/vendors for various components that are used with their software. Such companies include: IMO, Clinical Architecture, Health Language, Cerner, Apelon, Booz Allen Hamilton, Deloitte, ManTech Health, and Regenstrief LOINC. I work in the sub-specialty area of clinical terminology, which encompasses the diagnosis terminology of SNOMED together with the financial/billing terminoloy sets of ICD-10 and CPT, as well as an ever expanding list of other terminologies for other specific uses, such as lab (LOINC) or mental health (DSM-5). Hospital systems, insurance companies, and other entities now have massive amounts of data they can pull from patients' EHR sources. The newest focus is on doing analytics on that data and being able to extract data for specific uses, such as to identity social determinants of health. The job market for these uses as an analyst is huge, so if you are analytically-oriented, learn as much as you can about using excel spreadsheets and how to set up SQL queries. So job searches for "healthcare analyst" and "clinical analyst".

She will be sentenced in January, but still has an unrestricted RN license in Idaho. https://gazette.com/news/patrick-frazee-mistress-krystal-lee-gets-sentencing-date/article_7b208648-1508-11ea-b55b-7781b9e35243.html

I think many nurses are not aware that criminal behavior not related to their work as a nurse can land them in front of their nursing board. When I was in nursing school in Calif (many moons ago), we had to attend the Calif board's disciplinary hearings one day. I remember a nurse who had gotten a DUI being quite surprised that they were going to suspend her license. I'm not sure how the board was informed about this nurse's DUI. (I'm guessing either the district attorney's office informed the board, or that the board routinely runs a check for new criminal charges against currently licensed nurses). Here's a good overview of what the boards will look at: https://www.ncsbn.org/2016DCM_DJohnston.pdf HollyVK RN, BSN, JD

On Thanksgiving Day 2018, a young mother was savagely beaten to death by her fiance' in Colorado. The fiance's married, long time girl friend is an RN in Idaho. He attempted to induce her to do the murder herself. She could not do it, but had multiple opportunities to report his plans to authorities. And while she didn't participate in the murder itself, she was tasked by him with cleaning up the murder scene in the young mother's condo--and again she failed to inform authorities about the murder. https://www.denverpost.com/2019/02/20/kelsey-berreth-murder-patrick-frazee-nurse-affair I am completely disgusted by this RN's behavior, as I am sure are her former coworkers, friends, and relatives. In addition to permanently losing her RN license, I hope she gets some prison time.

Dear Soon To Be Peds Nurse, A dedicated national children's hospital like CHOP is going to have very high acuity patients, especially when compared to less urban community hospitals. CHOP is also going to have many very unique diagnosis patients, lots of congenital abnormalities and trauma patients. Besides the difference between NICU and PICU patients in general, you should also consider the respective size of the two units and what sort of specialty care they do. Will you have to work with burn patients or heart transplant patients in the PICU? Do you have children of your own; if so, you may find it more difficult with with patients of the same age as you own. The NICU patients usually stay in that unit until they go home, while the PICU patients get transferred to other floors as they improve. You should ask for a tour of each unit and the opportunity to speak to some of the staff RNs to find out more about what they like about their units. Good Luck to You! HollyVK RN, BSN, JD former NICU & PICU nurse

Dear L&D Nurse, Unfortunately a Performance Improvement Plan (a "PIP" in HR jargon) is management speak for "you're not a fit here and you need to go." So gather up your dignity and find yourself another position, probably at another facility as you may be restricted from transferring at your current facility with your PIP status. If you linger, hoping against hope that things will work out for you, you most certainly will be terminated. And then you may find it very difficult to find another comparable position with a termination in your work history. Some facilities have a blanket "will not hire" prohibition for an RN who has been terminated from a previous position. Good luck to you. HollyVK RN, BSN, JD

Actually BornToCare, I've spent time with Fakir Musafar (http://www.bodyplay.com) who originated the "Primitive Body Art" movement in this country. If you're not familiar with his works, you should check it out. Also, no one said that everyone who has a tattoo is a scuzzy person or a criminal. What I said was that older people tend to associate having tattoos with that sort of behavior. Do many older people routinely interact with younger people who are sporting copious body art? No, because just as you probably tend to hang mostly with folks your own age, so do our seniors spend their time mostly with their own age group and their families. And for Mskate, in a perfect world all our patients and their families would be completely competent and unbiased, appropriately educated, and have the tolerance and understanding of Buddha, so that body art would never be an issue. But in the real world, it can cause anxiety and distrust in patients and families. And again, your appearance is not always about what you want/like/demand. I think those of you sporting body art should look upon yourselves as ambassadors for this form of physical expression, you're going to be introducing the reality of it to groups of people with either no experience with it or with preconceived (often negative) ideas about it. It's sort of like the gay movement, "those people" are just wrong/bad/etc until you realized that your favorite nephew or hairdresser (who is a really great guy) is gay. So just do the good nursing you always do and let your actions speak louder than your appearance.

The rule in the real world is, "Never get a tattoo where a judge will see it." While body art is common for folks in Generation Y, it used to be a sign that you'd been in the Navy, or in jail, or in a gang. So why do employers want you to cover up your tats and limit your piecing jewelry? Because your job is not all about you, it's mostly about your patients--many of whom are older and do not share your appreciation of body art or think it is "kool" at all. At best, they may just think it shows questionable judgment on your part, but at worst, they may think you must have had a scuzzy or criminal past . . . Now you're thinking to yourself, "But that's SO unfair!" Well yes, but we all make assumptions based on appearance. So your employer may reasonably expect that you will have a professional appearance that will not detract from or interfere with your professional duties. And speaking as an old RN (who has seen it all and done it all, but no personal tats), the tattoos and piercings are going to be completely out of fashion in a few more years. :selfbonk: And then it will be time to visit the laser tattoo removal clinic, which having assisted with such procedures I can tell you are both expensive and painful. Good luck to all of you who are dealing personally with this issue.

In light of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling yesterday in the Savana Redding case yesterday (13 year old girl subjected to strip search for ibuprofen at school, witnessed by the school secretary and the the school nurse, was found to be a violation of her civil rights), does anyone see a problem with the school nurse having participated in the strip seach? Are drug searches a normal part of the school nurse job? Did this nurse exceed her authority and/or display very bad judgement? Is this something the Arizona Board of Nursing should investigate? I throw these questions out there for discussion, and I can provide more info about the court's ruling if needed. Thanks, HollyVK RN, BSN, JD

Agatha, A couple of brief points: 1) Paragraphs are a good thing :nuke: cuz they make your info much easier to read. 2) Not all employers shy away from releasing "fired for cause" info. The largest hospital employer in the US has a posted policy about how termination info is to be coded in their HR system and what info will be released to other potential employers. Their view is that other employers are entitled to know the true status of the former employee's work separation from them. And they are apparently sufficiently secure in using this process that they are not fearful of litigation. http://ec.hcahealthcare.com/CPM/HROP028.doc

Dear DMN, First of all, THANK YOU for working with the patients (acute psych) that many of us find difficult or impossible to work with. Secondly, thank you for providing patient care that keeps all your patients safe. Regarding your immature physician situation, here is my advice. YES, filing the incident report for such a situation should always be done. As you stated, there are 2 issues here: the physician's failure to follow medical staff rules for seclusion that relate to patient and staff safety plus the inappropriate behavior on her part creating a hostile work environment. As to filing a complaint with the medical board, yes you can do it, but as an non-management employee, it's not really your responsibility or place to do so. The better route is to get your manager to follow up with the risk manager to make sure the issue goes to medical staff board for action. If the physician's behavior has been an ongoing problem with the staff, make sure that info gets to the risk manager as well. And since you are blessed (yes, blessed) to have both governmental employment and union protection, you can pursue the harassment issue through the state HR and the union venues. But I would wait to see what your manager and risk management can do first. Certainly you can mention to your manager that you are so upset about the hostile workplace issue you may pursue it further through HR and the union if the hospital administration lets it drop. Maybe the larger question is why is this physician working in acute psych as it certainly does not appear to be a good match for her. Perhaps being dressed down by the medical staff board will motivate her to find a different practice situation. I hope this is helpful. HollyVK, RN, BSN, JD

while the feds can impose marshall law during such a situation, unless you're in the military or national guard, i don't believe they can make you work. the more likely problem that will be encountered will be for those nurses already at work--if they leave without being replaced by another nurse, it can be deemed patient abandonment. the board of nursing could take action against you. and based on what happpened to the rns and doctors left stranded with patients following the hurricane in new orleans, not only will you be stuck, you may also be tried on criminal charges even after you've done your best to take care of the patients in a horrendous situation. i had a small taste of the situation when some 25 years ago, when we had a blizzard here that snowed in the day shift for 24 hours. when i was able to get in, 12 hrs after i should have been there, the day shift nurses were crying with relief, they were so tired and so happy to see a replacement. if we have a contagious, highly fatal outbreak of some sort, it will be bad, very bad . . . . . hollyvk

No, do not list it, and even if you do not list it, a future employer cannot find it. Only the IRS has compete records of what employers you've worked for, and this info cannot be tapped for an employment check (unless you're applying for a high level governmental security clearance). Good luck to you, HollyVK RN, BSN, JD