malepsychRN

Don't stress too much before starting; you will learn the most important things on the job. When you start on the unit take mental note of how experienced RN's and techs on the unit handle difficult clients. No matter how the clients are acting, always treat them as you would treat any other adult person--with respect; take care not to talk down to anyone. When you need to set limits, give a rationale. Give the mental health techs the same amount of respect you do the MDs and RNs.

metrical pound, I understand and accept that it is dangerous in psych--what has changed for us a few months ago is that on weekends and evenings the rest of the building is entirely empty--there is no one to call for a code. My main question is: Is it a reasonably safe work environment to have all female staff or me as the only guy with female staff with no back up except to call the police? (I've been punched a couple times and scratched once, though coworkers have gotten black eyes, and hair pulls. We are excellent at verbal deescalation and I'm pretty quick when I need to get out of the way!)

macfar28, Thanks for your input. Also, I could add we have an "open concept" nursing station--unless we abandon it completely and lock ourselves in the med room we are quite exposed. We have had to call police to the unit 8 times in the last couple of months (which is way more than normal) due dangerous patients we've been having. The police have been great, but we have no real plan for self preservation in the 5-10 minutes they take to arrive.

I've been working for 3.5 years on an adult inpatient crisis stabilization unit and as of last summer the other units in our building moved to another location, so we are a free-standing 16 bed unit. There are outpatient and maintenance staff we can call for codes during weekday business hours, but evenings, weekends, and nights the rest of the building is literally empty except for us. We apparently have good staffing ratios: 3 RNs and 3 techs (sometimes less if we get a call-off) for our 16 bed unit which is usually full or close to it. We have 1 security person; the full-time security person on evening shift is female. The majority of techs are female and I'm the only male RN. Sometimes evenings and night shift is all female staff and we have lots of staff over 55 years old. I'm a reasonably fit male RN 5'-7" 155# in my 40's. Sometimes I'm the only male in the entire building and we have to deal with psychotic, agitated, threatening male patients who are 6" taller and 100# heavier than me. At the our last RN meeting, several RN's including myself expressed that we don't feel safe--and we were once again blown off by the manager. So my questions are: 1. Are there any other psych RN's out there on a free-standing unit, and what do you do to handle large agitated patients who can't be talked down? 2. Does this sound like a reasonably safe work environment? 3. Should I be looking for work elsewhere?...I'm thinking about leaving, but I live 5 minutes from work, my coworkers are really great, the psychiatrists treat the RN's well, and I've worked enough different jobs in various fields to know every job has a downside.