clc79092

Where I work several people are leaving due to management. We have an excellent unit clerk who is starting nursing school and needs to go part time. There is a part time position posted for our unit but the Assistant Director told her she needs to find another job ASAP. They just changed our staffing plan to run us even shorter that has been the usual. We have a very high patient turn over rate ( lots of admits transfers and discharges). They even expect the charge nurse to take patients most of the time. Now a charge nurse (I have been relief charge) that is taking patients and trying to charge is not going to be of any real help to anyone else on the unit. I am considering looking in south Texas for a different postion. The only problem is I like the people I work with but the management stinks.

I had a doctor as a patient who decided to give himself a 1000 cc bolus of d5 1/2 ns with 20 of KCL. I just hung another bag and as I reset the correct rate I locked the pump. I then informed his doctor and documented what had happened. My patient was also on a pca and would speed up the iv rate so when he hit the button for another dose it would go in faster.. He was pissed when he could not manipulate the pump anymore.

Outdated useless nonfunctional..........mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm................does my relief charge nurse count?

Tikosyn--side effect of possible sudden death. Not a drug I want to give any time and certainly not as the patients first dose.

I live in the Texas Pnahandle and my employer expects me to show up regardless of the weather. When the Highway Patrol closes the interstate ( which is the only road that I can take to get to work (30 miles) my employer still expects me to come in even though driving on the closed road is considered a crime.

I do not believe that working while others strike is unethical since I have a strong distaste for unions but then I was raised in Texas which has not been brainwashing people for decades about how great unions are. The patients come first! Someone has to take care of them while you are drinking you latte and waving a sign. If you do not like the conditions of employment then be an adult about it (quit whining and saying someone owes us more) just quit and find a job that you are happy with. If you want to be the ones in charge in a hospital or anywhere else for that matter the go into business for youself and invest your own money.

I would not work for the VA for love or money! When I graduated the first and only place I applied was the VA. That is where I wanted to be even though they paid a little less than the other local hospitals. I interveiwed and was told the job was mine. I did my physical and the doctor went on vacation before filing her report. Every week for 10 weeks I was told I had the job they just needed to get the doctors report to give me a start date. After the doctor returned from her vaction she had lost everything. I was called and asked to come to her office for a few questions. When I arrived I had to redo the complete physical including 14 x-rays. Finally after 10 weeks of frustration I was told I could not work for the government since I had had knee surgery 10 years previously (arthroscopic). The lady (and I use that term very loosely) running HR was smug and took great delight in telling me I was not a fit candidate for a nurse for the government. I did not meet their high standards. I graduated with honors. I went that day to another hospital applied, interviewed and was hired the next day. I work in a telemetry/ stepdown unit. The 12 hour shifts have never bother my knee either. If the government needs nurses too bad they can just stuff it.

We have a 32 bed cardiac stepdown unit. Tonite our census started at 17 with three dismissal and two direct admits. There were 2 RN's, 1 Lvn and a RN charge nurse. I had 6 patients to start with since one of the admits came right before shift change (strange how all the work was left for the night shift). From 1830 till about 0100 I ran my tail off. Patient with CP, one getting blood (that was ordered for 0900 the morning before and left for nights), 1 chest tube, 1 heparin drip, 1 wanting pain meds every 3 hours on the dot since the doctor told him he could get it that often if he really needed it, 1 helpless as a newborn (generalized weakness). CNA? we never see them on nights.

Where I work is a cardiology step down unit. Three months ago in an effort to decrease the payment of stipend shifts (10 to 20 dollars per hour extra) we were required to sign up for 2 on call shifts per month but since our unit is self schedule many of us sign up for days that it is unlikely we will be called in. Does not always work as I got called in a couple days ago. Our hospital routinely refuses to accept more patients if there are not enough nurses and the charge nurse and house supervisor cannot find anymore wiling to come in. Most of us are still mad at the 2 on/call days since it had been just one day a month. Depending on the staffing situation sometimes (rarely) we may be required to work in CCU but since the CCU unit has many more staff available it is more common to see the CCU nurses working on the cardiology floor. Our supervisors ask if we can come in but readily take "no" for an answer. Our charge nurses try not to take patients so they can be available to help everyone but if the admission of one or more patients is putting an undue burden on the staff they readily take patients. We don't usually clock out after our shift until we check to make sure no other nurse on the floor is behind and we offer to help where we can. This makes it a much more pleasant place to work.

I work for NWTHS in Amarillo. Looking at the UHS website (they own NWTHS) they are offering 24000 sign on to go to Eagle Pass TX for 2 years and 50000 (for 4 years) to work at their new Heart Hospital in McAllen TX. They are short of nurses throughout most of their facillities in Tx.