Rottie1

I am also wanting to see how other hospitals handle sick and vacation time. We are wanting to bring this up to our board of managers, and I was hoping to gather some info from other parts of the country. We don't actually get and "sick days" we get an "extended illness balance" (EIB) which is accumulated at a very minimal rate and the policy actually states that you cannot get paid from you EIB until you have been out sick for more than 6 consecutive calender days. In the mean time you have to use whatever PTO you have. You would get paid from the EIB starting the 7th day of your illness. Does this sounds like we are being taken advantage of? And how are holidays paid? We accrue paid time off (PTO) as we work. something like 7 hours per 80 hour work period for new hires then it increases as we work there longer. And if we are not scheduled on the holiday they take 8 hours of our PTO. Again does that sound right? How are other facilities managing the PTO and sick time?

Well, yesterday we (director, clinical coordinator, 5 area specialists) had a talk with the head of the OR. We told him all about how we are unhappy with the measly call pay ($1.50/hr), too much time spent at work and not enough pay. Two of our nurses have signed on w/an agency and have given their 2 week notice. He was (or at least seemed) interested in our suggestions: 1. Call pay should be 1/2 of our salary per hour 2. Do not take away any call pay just because we have been called in 3. Hire a weekend crew so we don't have to be on call on weekends 4. Pay us time and a half when we do come out regardless if we have worked 40 hours that week or not Well, it all sounded good and of course he seemed to hear us and acted as if he were going to do something about it. But I won't be holding my breath. As a matter of fact I have been checking with some agencies for local work. Oh, well he did say he was trying to get the call pay increased sooner than January but it will be only $3/hr. They just don't understand. I am sure he is happy getting a nice fat paycheck every two weeks - so he doesn't see any problems.

Stevierae, Exactly! We do elective cases on saturday (supposedly only on saturday), and there have been times when an emergency comes in whether it is an appy or a crani, at that point we call in the back up crew. We have a seperate heart call crew also and there have been times when another surgeon wants to do a CABG so what do those folks do - call all their buddies and see if anyone wants to volunteer to come in - and they gather enough people willing to come in. The surgeons always treaten to tell administration that we are not doing their cases and then we hear it from them. One day I was in charge for a while, (before I had to do my own case - on a weekday) and a heart surgeon wanted to add something, I told him he could go AFTER the cabg that was going that would be 1730. Later after someone else was in charge I get a call from administration telling me that I should call some people in to do the case, I told them there was no one, people were ill or whatever. Next thing I know they called the front desk where someone else was in charge and told them that we had to do the case! Guess what he said - Okay. So they did it with a partial heart team and some others. If a surgeon calls and wants to put something on we have basically been told that we cant say no. even if we keep tagging on cases at the bottom of the schedule, our OR is supposed to be closed to elective cases at 2100. We have done Lap Choles and fx hips starting after 2100. And most of the time the call crew has been at work since 0630. We have asked them to close a room for staffing shortages and the director is the one that says "oh no, they won't go for that, the OR is the money maker" We will see how many rooms they close after 4 or more nurses leave within the next couple of months. I also wonder why patients don't refuse to have their surgery after 4pm, they should know that the surgeon has probably been up for some time now and who knows how much sleep he or she has had the night before. I will check out those labor laws and see if there is something we can do for all the nurses there. Thanks for the feedback. Esther

I have been in the OR for 4 years now, getting $19.86 an hour with $1.50/hr for call, which can range from 1 night a week to 4 nights a week, we average 1 1/2 weekends in a six week period. Our call pay is stopped if we go in to work. We only get time and a half if we are over 40 hrs in a 1 week period. Brand new nurses coming into the OR get aroun $14 and change an hour. plus of course everyone gets some kind of sign on bonus, but then you are stuck there for however many years you signed on. They do offer a tuition assistance, as an incentive but that is pretty much it. not too much to brag about.

I work in the OR in Oklahoma City, I have only been there 4 years, start pay (for all newnurses) was 14. and change 4 years ago since then I have had several pay raises due to the hospital upgrading the payscale, or annual or increased responsibilities now I get $19.46 / hour. Not really high but not bad for this part of the country. Also we only get $1.50 an hour while on call, but get this they stop the $1.50 if we come in to work then we only get paid our regular pay. I have yet to understand that one, does anyone else have to deal with this? We do get 75 cents more an hour if we are CNOR.

I have had occasional back strains while on the job, but they have always seemed to work themselves out, with a little help from ibu and hot baths. But now it seems that my back is always achy and sore, can't remember any one particular thing that I did to cause this. I did just turn 39 last week, maybe I am getting older and my body is telling me to stop working so hard- either that or I just need a new mattress. :chuckle

Good Grief! I can't believe how much I have been laughing reading all of these poop stories! I am holding my breath as if I were there doing all the clean up myself! One memorable poop story was when I was working in the ED as a PCT we had a fairly frequent flyer: female, with lower limb paralysis, and 400+#s, but could have been over 600 (that is what my memory is telling me). Of course she was constipated and again of course the ED Doc orders a SSE and of course the PCTs get to do the honors. It was very smelly to say the least. The memoralble part was when her daughters (after being gone for the "treatment" ) came back with two mini rose bushes for the nice PCTs who endured everything they would not do at home. The sad part is I had to do this same patient/treatment once more during the 2 years I worked there. Oh and I still have the little rose bush in my flower bed! Something to remember her by.:roll

I have never witnessed a surgeon throwing anything at anyone, but we had one surgeon bustining on another room to whine about some instruments he wanted for his case. It was a very uncomfortable situation. But the hospital took it seriously and took those involved aside and investigated the whole thing. That surgeon no longer has privileges at the hospital (not just because of that, there were other problems too). I have see surgeons throw instruments onto the floor just because they don't work or are not what they wanted. I have heard stories of surgeons that used to throw things or just throw fits, and after enough incidents they ended up going to anger management or something because they come back all cool and in control.

This problem is not unique to nursing, before nursing I was in the military as an aircraft mechanic, and it was the same thing. It isn't just a night shift thing either. Every shift seems to believe that they are the ones that do more work. I have worked different shifts in nursing on different units and as it was said prior, each shift has it's own specific demands. We all need to work as a team, I know there will be those that don't think they have to work as hard as others, but what is the priority here? Patient care. NO? So regardless of what others are doing, lets get it together for the patient.