EC1234

In the beginning when I make rounds I always refer to my patients by Mr/Mrs. Each time we make rounds we have to write the patient's name, date, RN, and CNA on the marker board in their rooms so before I do that I always ask them how they would like to be addressed and I write that name on the board and address them as such. It never hurts to ask. I've had some elder patients who have preferred to be called by their first names.

Hello! Well, I'm single and don't have kids so my situation's easy. But I work a 4-12am shift (although they don't let us leave our unit until 12:30am) so I don't get home till 1am. I don't usually get to sleep till 3am and I usually sleep in (why the heck not!) Usually run my errands during the day before heading off to work. I love this shift because I am NOT a morning person (tend to run late for early morning activities), and no matter how early I get up, I am never quite ready to go to bed so I end up doing other stuff to kill time and don't usually get to bed till 1am earliest. I would prefer your 3-11pm over the 4pm-12:30am though!

Well, I think in Med-Surg you're guaranteed to be on your feet almost everyday you come in to work. But in the ICU you may or may not depending on your pt workload. I did a year of precepting in the ICU and from what I've witnessed, yeah there were some nurses who didn't get the luck of the draw and ended up w/ "heavy" pts, but for the most part nurses were sitting around chatting and monitoring at the nurses station (in addition to giving meds, turning pts, documenting, but they only have 2 pts!). I am a new grad and started in Tele, and let me tell you, I am getting a lot of experience here! It's a great place to start!

I was just wondering if outpatient and inpatient nurses in the hospital get paid the same amount of money because it appears that nurses who work in outpatient settings have the simple tasks of escorting the patients to the exam room and taking blood pressures. Or is the job actually a lot harder than it looks? I mean if this is the case, I might as well be working in outpatient setting to reduce the stress.

hi! i'm working in at kaiser in cali and am paid by the hour. OT, which is anything over 40hrs/wk or 8hrs/day (aka a double or 2 consecutive shifts), is paid time and a half for the first 4 hrs and double for the last 3.5 hrs.