POE

I like waking sometime in the afternoon, drinking coffee on my patio, catching the afternoon(5pm) news, and leisurely getting my day going. The moment I work through the doors its all Banzaibuckaroo, full tilt boogie until the very wee hours, when the clinicstuff fades out, and kidneystones,MIs,ODs, and diabetic emergencies dominate, but usually a slow paced last 3 hours . Charge nurses are paid 83cents/hr more. Not worth the hassle. I love what I do, I'm not using this position to go on to "better things". Some of the best RN nurses I've ever seen were LPN first. You won't hear trash talk from me. I work the 2on/2off/3on/2off/2on/3off that seems to predominate now, but selfscheduling is in place. I just like the predictability. I usually work one extra shift a payperiod.

I can't speak for Ralph, but I work ER, nights exclusively, am an ADN, and bring down about 70-80k/yr. With 15yrs under my belt. Of course, thats in Louisiana...

I have worn just about everything a man can wear, but my choice for the past 5-6 years has been..Dr Scholl's !! They only cost 25$ @ Wal-Mart, have great support(gellin like a felon), and in 3-4 months I demote them to knockaround status. Then when I demote the next pair, they become my yardmowing shoes. I am a real advocate of taking good care of my feet, but I don't feel the need to impress anyone. Whatever you choose, make sure fashion is the least of the purchase factors.

Not to our faces! And we seem to be a stabilizing influence on MD's that have a rep for throwing things around and generally intimidating the girls. If they want to play that way, I would invite them to play basketball after work..REAL physical basketball...POE

Boy Howdy, what a hot button topic! If the powers that be knew in 1918 what they know now, maybe they would have promoted reefer as an incredibly safer alternative to the freshly outlawed ETOH. Organized crime kept from the tsunami of cash that party hungry younguns, bored/traumatized vets, and the others that life isn't life if it isn't altered bring/brought; cops that could concentrate on real threats to life and property that simple potsmoking doesn't engender ; amateur botanists not breeding max THC to minimize weight. But it didn't happen that way. I've quietly slipped pot and pipes into the sharps container to keep a patient from having his health issue becoming a legal one. That keeps me a PATIENT advocate. Someone they can discreetly tell the ..discomfiting points to, knowing I will do what I can to help THEM. If this was an issue for you, why couldn't you discuss with the patient that you needed to not see that, or anything like it, again. Until america finally faces the fact that we're diverting far too many legal resources away from SERIOUS dangers, chasing stoners instead of violent criminals and law/tech savvy bankers and other terrorists, we face this dilemma. When it's you there, suddenly faced with something you're shocked or scared by, all of this second guessing is just that! Try to remember, we're there for the patient. Not the cops, or administrators, or anyone else. If you feel their health is endangered, express your worries to them initially, your supervisor if you feel like you've been ignored or purposely placed in " a situation"

I work the industry standard on 2, off 2, on 3; then off 2, on 2, off three now, but have worked 5 on,2 off, 2 on, 5 off, as well as 7 on, 7 off and the "Baylor Plan", where I worked Every fri/sat/sun and got a 6$/hr bonus to make up the difference. Notice the flexibility? Few jobs offer that; but more importantly..I feel I'm making a difference in my patients lives, I don't have that sense of powerlessness in the household emergencies, and if I rub the shiny off this pretty little job or become too decrepit I can use this degree for something else. RN isn't the opening of a door, it's the opening of 100.

My factory job went to Singapore in the mideighties, and I didn't. While working as a manual laborer, a coworker related how his wifes' nurse pay was keeping them afloat. Until then I considered nurses in the same catagory as teachers(repected but woefully underpaid). My old ACT scores in hand, I went to the local nursing school my next day off. Three years later I got my ADN. I haven't been unemployed for a day I didn't want to be since. I prefer nights for all the reasons mentioned earlier in this thread. I've been a Marine, a roughneck, a stripper, truckdriver, factory worker, bill collector and biker. These things are assets in the ER, but I'm pretty sure I would find myself crossways with the clipboard nurses running this place during the day... My kids have grown up tiptoeing around if tonight is a worknight for poppa, and tearing off for three day weekends camping, daytripping to the amusement parks and hundreds of other kewl places when I'm off. I've been able to be a room daddy for them when they were in elementary school. That may have been the best! Good luck, and be satisfied! DO NOT GET INTO THIS FOR THE MONEY ALONE, YOU'LL BE MISERABLE!

SaudiSmith, I feel ya. My bride and I spent a year in the Magic Kingdom2001-2002(yes, we were in Jeddah on 9/11). Loved the SCUBA, and shopping in Balad. If your hospital is KFSH I was there. The MD's were at that time mainly Canadians, with a Scot and an Aussie, and rarely an American. The "Saudization" of their medical and nursing staff scared hell out of me..you never knew when prayer time would leave you shortstaffed for an hour while they let you perform the work that ENSHA'ALLAH would be done, or work a code for 2 hours because a good muslim wouldn't declare another dead, stopping only when a western MD was given the helm so to speak. Your best option in my opinion is to remind everyone that change is THE only constant, this is the system the powers that be have adopted, and that thier contract is up in X months, then they can get back to their beloved procedures. Until then, this is what we have, it's our job to give it the fulltilt boogie backup administration expects. What ever paperless system they've bought, it has pros and cons, but is being used elsewhere in the world. Maybe you can find out where else that it's being used and seek input(not unlike you've done here)as to how to encourage compliance without complaint!