ATTrailRN

I am a newish RN (just at the 2 year mark) that I feel still struggles with time management for whatever the reason may be that day. It is not unusual for me to clock out an hour late - leaving around 8:20pm-8:30pm. It has never been a problem up until now and has never been brought up to me before. There are quite a few RNs staying late. Now that our hospital is low census they are really cracking down on our time - our charge nurses day now seems to mostly consist of ensuring every RN is clocked back in from break by 3pm and yesterday morning during huddle we were told we need to ensure that we clock out at the end of our shift by 7:45pm - this was the first I’ve heard of it. Yesterday I clocked out at 7:55pm. Yes, I did realize that I was late however I still had charting to be done and I think it’s unfair to expect me to finish charting off of the clock (which a couple of RNs were doing). As I was clocking out another RN told me I was supposed to have clocked out by 7:30pm which I guess I didn’t hear about because I was charting during evening huddle. I woke up this morning, on my day off, to a missed call and a text from my manager to call her back. I did but no answer so waiting to hear back. I am assuming it is in regards to my late clock out. And I have a feeling my options will be to allow her to change the time or to get written up. What would you do? I don’t want to get in trouble over something I knew I was doing, but I think it’s unfair and we need to stand up for ourselves. It really feels like they are trying to see how thin they can stretch us. I have a feeling even after the pandemic low census ends they will continue to stretch us this thin because they know it is possible. Background- we are a newish 30 bed cardiac PCU. Before the pandemic began we were always told that we were to have a RN:Patient ratio of 3:1 with 2 support staff (1 unit clerk and 1 tech). As you may have guessed the 1 tech on a 30 bed unit isn’t available often. They don’t get vitals, blood sugars, answer call lights? etc., they are just there as a resource which is usually not bad because you can always get help from another RN. When we are 4:1 we are supposed to have 3 support staff (1 unit clerk and 2 techs). Since this pandemic has began our unit is not as full but we have been having 4 patients daily with only 1 tech, and our tech yesterday was sent home at 3 apparently because she “wasn’t helping”. I had one AMS patient that was a REAL handful (let’s just say he was found with his head at the foot of the bed 3 times before 9am yesterday and two days ago he rolled out of bed to the floor with all 4 side rails up), 2 surgical SBO patients that, while they didn’t really meet PCU criteria they did require frequent ambulation which is a 2 person assist, and another nonsurgical SBO that again required frequent ambulation. I feel they are asking too much of us being 4:1 with no tech. Not to mention I started my shift with a few messes to fix from night shift. I probably could’ve been out on time but around 6pm another RN had to travel with a patient to a test and asked to to help with a med pass, which consisted of giving an IV with an infiltrated IV ? I am not worried about my manager thinking I am slacking off as she knows I always work hard, I do things as asked, and nobody complains about me. But she wants to me to leave things undone so that I can clock out by 7:37pm.

Bump?

Hi, I really love kids and I am thinking into the future about what would be best working wise when I have young kids. I was really thinking about a school nursing job, like elementary school specifically? Does anyone know the salary differences? Or if you need any extra schooling for a school nurse? I am in LPN school now and am eventually going to get my RN and then hopefully BSN, so it will be a few years, but have just been thinking about it recently.

I am not a nurse quite yet but I am in nursing school. But, me being a CNA before nursing school, I get the gist of it. I noticed that when I was working PRN I was feeling the exact same. I didn't know anything about my patients and it's so hard to even remember everything that the previous CNA was telling me when giving me her shift report. She would say names or even room numbers and it was so hard to make it stick in my head, not knowing who that patient actually was. It is hard to feel like you have helped someone when you know nearly nothing about them. Eventually I moved on to more hours and omg I felt SO much better! You know how if you meet a COMPLETE new group of people and didn't know anybody, it is extremely hard to remember everyone's names? That's how PRN was to me except it was remembering their history, what works best with them etc. But you know how if you already know some of the people in a group, you don't have to try to remember so many new people's names? Thats how it is the more and more hours you work. You practically have to remember a complete new group of people every time you come in, that's tough! When you work more days, there's only a couple of new people every day. Working more days more me made everything a piece of cake, I knew what my patients soft spots were and really felt connected to them. I even had some people ask me to tape a piece of paper saying what days/hours I worked each week so that they could look forward to it, and that was so rewarding! It's even the same if you have to float to a different floor for a day, you get very confused and don't feel like you do as good. Sorry that this is so long, I just have been in your position (except as a CNA of course) and I know how frustrating and upsetting it is. I'm sure the nurse's completely understand that you won't know your patients nearly as well as them, I understood when I had PRNs during my previous shift. You completed the same schooling as them and everyone knows how hard you had to work to get there, so no one is looking down on you. Good luck! :)

they still let me go (: have you found out if you got in yet??

no i haven't even started! i also thought that i didn't have to call to schedule an appointment for a background screening till April 19th. but i just looked and we were suppossed to do it by april 5th! it says if you dont do it by the deadline you could be forfeiting your seat in the program so now i'm very nervous. i'm calling as soon as i get out of class but now i'm 7 days late! :/

yay congrats!! and no, she did not. did they email you back?

Yes go to sfcollege.edu/healthsciences, on the right there is a yellow link that says "students accepted to programs" click that, then scroll to practical nursing and print out all of those. they have all of the information. i have a friend that got on the alternate list but she is a little confused. do you need to still get your shots and background check before they let her know if she is going to be in the program? or do you wait until they tell you that you are in?

that's still good! today i went to the health science counseling office about accepting or denying and was wanting to know how many days a week it is and what hours of the day it is. they straight out told me that they couldn't tell me right now. all they said was that its going to be full time and that "sometimes i may not have school on tuesdays but i might have clinicals that evening. or i might have clinicals on saturday" and that i would get a schedule on the first day of school. personally i think this is a really bad idea. there are a lot of people with families and jobs that need to schedule ahead of time, not the day before. i already know of one person who is declining it because she is worried about not being able to find alternative daycare at last minute. and i have a feeling there will be quite a few of people with this problem so there's still a really good chance you'll get in. good luck!

oh also, i have 54 points but I also graduated from the Academy of Health Professions at my high school and that has a really big pull on it.

I had about 54 points I think. Plus I got a C in BSC2085 (A&P1) but am currently in BSC2086 (A&P2) but it says they combine those for points so i'm not sure if i got any points for it or not. I'm not sure if I am going to accept or decline yet though. I am thinking about waiting and doing the RN program, but to do that I'd have to wait another year bc I don't have the pre-req microbiology yet so i cant apply this year. I am pretty sure I'm going to accept this LPN but am just going to ponder on it first. I really want to do lpn now cause i'm so excited but at the same time I am only 18 so I'm not really in a rush. Congrats Karenflrz and good luck khall23!! Do you guys know when we have to have our background check and drug screening done by? It says in the letter that it takes about 2 weeks for after we do it for sfc to actually get the results so to "plan accordingly" but i don't see anywhere where it says when we need them in by?

did you get your letter yet? i got in! :)

thats faster than i thought but its gonna come sooooo slow! i hope so as well. good luck to you and let me know how it turns out!

do you have any idea about how long it takes for them to send out acceptance/denial letters?

yeah i dual enrolled my senior year of highschool and failed an american politics. i'm hoping they'll see that i was still in highschool then and also see that i'm retaking it this semester for grade forgiveness.