Renee75

Aunttae....you sound like me! Rough isn't it? I'm on call again tonight from 11pm (sat) to 11am (Sun..Father's Day no less). I actually put in an application somewhere else last week. Wish me luck!

I think our problem is that we run on just a bare minimum crew. We have 3 RN's for our unit or 2 RN's and 1 LPN. We are L&D, PP and nursery AND GYN overflow. So we are quite stressed out. When we have an emergency C-Section, it takes all 3 of us to run a room...and who's watching the floor?? You might have guessed it...the secretary. Isn't that sad? So when somebody calls off, it is such a hardship. Last week I had to call the supervisor to watch the floor while we did a section. The poor lady didn't have a clue how to take care of anyone...but she did walk around and make sure people were safe and got them ice water and stuff. I wish we (nurses) could get handle on this healthcare crisis that we are in. Are other places running on a skeleton crew like we are??? Incidentally we are a 10 bed PP unit with 4 labor rooms. Sometimes we are all full. So you can see how very stressfull it can be on 3 nurses. When it's full like that our manager does go out on the floor and help, like maybe she'll "catch" all the babies and stuff like that. I don't know. I think we just need more money to hire more people.

Sorry for late reply..I worked til 3am and will go back in a couple of hours. I work in Ohio. It seems like there is a shortage but there really isn't as far as I can see. Sometimes units post jobs but they aren't hiring because the unit doesn't really have the money to spend. I have come across that a few times. I don't know why they even bother to post jobs that they have no intention of filling. OB jobs are hard to come by. But like I said, you can see jobs in the newspaper, but when you go to apply it's "sorry...try again later... I got to go eat, shower...and back at it again...talk to you all later

I know it's ridiculous at my place but walking is not optional right now. I was laid off from another hospital last fall and lucky to find work in OB. I have to feed my family and provide insurance. It's work here or not work in OB. Not much of a choice right now. If it gets worse I may consider other optons.

WOW, I feel totally used at my place. They just called and wanted me to tack on another 4 hours of call Saturday after my 3p to 3am shift, that would make it 16 hrs, then come in again on 3p to 11:30p the next day. With summer coming and vacations...I don't know. The thing is.....if you don't sign up for all the slots, the manager actually fills your name in anywhere. I think this job was a little more than I bargained for. I don't mean to gripe. Just putting it into perspective for some of you. I REALLY wish that I didn't have to do all this call. the job is stressful enough. Actually most of the people are pretty nice. That's one reason I'm sticking around. But I really don't know for how long.

HI! I really hate being on call at my hospital because they make us take 32 hours of call per 4 week period..doesn't matter if you are part time or full time. To make it worse, you have no choice as to when you are on call. Many Times I get the call list last or next to last and there are no choices except to work 16 hour shifts to get your call time in. Let me just say that sometimes it's brutal and I may not even sta there much longer because of it. There must be a better way...:)