bubba143

If you have read my post from earlier this week you know that I have concerns about the facility I work at and the fact that accept head injury patients without proper staffing,etc,. The Director of Nursing called and when I called back she was unavailable so I spoke to the Nurse Manager. The Medical Director who was in house this past weekend and saw how this patient was acting is not happy with the things I said to him. I finally was able to talk to the Director of Nursing and the Medical Director wants to have a meeting with me, the DON and my Nurse Manager. I feel that nothing good will come of this meeting and I do not want to have it. First, I only work weekends and they want to reschedule my life to accommodate them. I work Per Diem for the town school system at two-three days a week. They wanted me to meet with them during my daughters school vacation next week! Secondly, I do not really like our DON. She does not stand up for nursing and she has already called me a trouble maker in the past. Although she denies that she ever said that to me. I guess I am a trouble maker because in my mind patients and staff should come first. I was just told yesterday by a fellow employee that we have another head injury patient that came in Monday and she kept throwing the phone and other things around the room. I feel like I am being cornered and I do not want to go to the meeting alone. Alot of people at work feel the same way, but they talk behind upper managements back. When confronted with the issues they never say anything. Am I allowed to bring a tape recorder to the meeting so that things are on record and it does not become a he said she said type of thing? I have started sending in other applications because I feel that I can no longer work at my current facility and feel that I am giving 100%. Plus I feel I will not be wanted there anymore. I have contacted OSHA and they were helpful, but they came right out and said, that with privately owned facilities things are wishy/washy. I am still looking online for info on head injury facility guidelines. Not having much luck so far, but I will keep looking. Looking for a plan for the meeting and an answer to above question about the tape recorder. Again any help greatly appreciated!:balloons: I feel that has a nurse, somehow we get lost in the decision making factor. This is very frustrating since it would seem that we would know what is best for the patient. Thank you for previous answers, suggestions and support! I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday Season!!!

;) I am so glad I found this site! I need to vent and looking for resources. I have worked at an acute rehab center for more then 10 years and I have enjoyed this job up until the last two years. We receive patients aged 18 and up. Car accidents, hip/knee replacements, s/p amputations, decontioned patients, etc,. Two years ago we were told that because of the new medicaid/medicare we were going to be accepting traumatic brain injury patients. We have 52 beds and I usually work 3p-11p. On this shift (if we are fully staffed) there are 5 nurses and 5 nurses aides on the floor. Dealing with the head injury patients at times can be difficult, especially when they first arrive, because they can be combative, loud and they wander all over the unit. We do not have a seperate unit for them. This patient will usually have an aide assigned to him, to watch and make sure he does hurt himself or others. This weekend I lost what little patience I had left. We admitted a head injury patient who is the most difficult we have had so far. He is physically strong and very mobile. He spent the whole weekend trying to get out of the facility and walking up and down the hallways swearing loudly. He kept walking into other patients rooms, swearing at them and at times we felt we had no way to control him. He did have a person assigned 1:1 with him, but everyone on the unit had to become involved in trying to keep everyone safe because he all over the place. When I expressed the nurses concerns to upper management, we received no backup support. We were told by the medical staff on call there was nothing he could do. He had already increased his PO medication and did not want to order anything IM because he was afraid one of us would get stuck with the needle. I totally agreed with this thinking, but I did not agree that the patient was appropriate for our facility. family members and patients were complaining to us and there was nothing we could do. This is the first time I have felt unsafe taking care of a patient. My fellow staff members and I are frustrated that upper management does not seem to care about our safety or the other patients safety. I received a phone call today from the Director of Nursing. She was not available when I called back so I spoke to my Nurse Manager. The Medical Director had spoken to her because he was not happy with some of the things I said this weekend. I told her what happened this weekend and how most of the other patients received very little attention because most of the staff members were spending time with him. Here are my questions: - Should I call OSHA and question how a facility becomes licensed to accept head injury patients and what the staffing ratio should be? - Should they have a seperate unit where they can wander without disturbing other patients? - Do we as nurses have the right without being reprimanded to express our concerns? I believe I will leave this job shortly,which I hate to do because I really like the people I work with. We as nurses feel like we are being abused because so much more is expected of us with no backup being offered. I am sure I will have more questions, but any help with these is greatly appreciated! Thank You!