GeneralistRN

Thanks carolina. It's sad that we have such hypersensitive people who take personal offense to critiques of their employers' reprehensible behaviors or their own inactions that enable their employers to get away with wage theft. Do people think so little of their profession that they want to shut down those of us who want to put an end to that exploitation? Only in nursing...

If you are consistently working through your lunch WITHOUT pay, then you're definitely having some issues going on. If it's not a problem with being assertive, then it's a problem with your time management, efficiency, or having trust in the people you work with. I've worked in a nationally recognized cardiothoracic ICU. Half the entire unit would leave for lunch at once while the other half covered their patients. Patient care didn't suffer as a result of the nurses having to keep an eye on 1 to 2 additional patients for thirty minutes. People just had the common sense to medicate for pain and so forth before stepping away from the unit, so that the covering RNs wouldn't be overburdened. Also, if it is indeed true that your manager is aware that you are working through your meal period without pay, and not recording it, then she stands to be disciplined by HR if discovered. You could be disciplined as well. In all likelihood, HR just hasn't heard that this takes place. Otherwise it would stop, fast, because it it violates federal wage law. No offense, but if you are working in a department where the expectation or culture is that you eat lunch on the unit, while working, then you are working in a real cesspool. That is not normal at all. If they are deducting thirty minutes of pay every day while you do this, well, that's just deplorable. And if I were a patient there and knew that the nurses were sitting at the desks greasing up the computers and monitors, eating while working in the unit, after just having gotten up to clean up bowel movements or something, I'd say something. That's just gross as all hell. Furthermore: to the the nurses making excuses for why they work through lunch, no one should condone what you are doing, which is enabling your employer to do something illegal, and I have no respect for you.

Unless you've been willfully neglectful to your patients before leaving to go eat, or haven't charted their vitals or condition your whole shift, then your license isn't going to be in jeopardy for some unexpected occurrence that takes place while you're off the unit. It doesn't happen. So... yeah. You aren't risking your license by going to lunch.

Sometimes people come from different backgrounds, have different upbringings, and have varying degrees of familiarity and acceptance of different groups of people. It is best to recognize the positive impact that this variety of worldviews has in healthcare, as it continually makes our professional environment more engaging and diverse.

Honesty is not a policy that is rewarded in nursing. I'm glad you learned something from this.

Never answer a question to a question without an answer.

Don't take this the wrong way, but there's something wrong with you if you don't feel comfortable leaving your patient for 30 minutes in the hands of your coworkers and consequently are taking meal periods on the floor without pay. I'm assuming you work in a critical care area if you have "critical patients." I see problems here. For one thing, you're eating lunch in the unit and caring for critically ill patients at the same time? You are nasty and dirty for doing that and I strongly doubt that it is allowed. Two, I've worked in critical care: both in a medical ICU and in a cardiothoracic ICU. Finding people to cover a critical patient for 30 minutes is not a big deal and there is no reason you shouldn't feel comfortable doing that. Lastly, if you're at lunch at the doctor says he need to put in an art line and needs help (although I don't know why he would even need your help with an art line after the timeout...), then you just tell whoever is calling you that "I can't help right now; I'm at lunch. Tell him he has to find someone else." Problem solved. Learn to assert yourself.

You can't permit your employer to get away with not paying you for a meal period that is interrupted. Anything that they had you "sign off" is immaterial and cannot override the FLSA, which requires that they pay you. The manager can say it's your fault for not finding coverage, until they are blue in the face, but they must still pay you.

If it's interrupted, then by law you must be paid for the meal period.

I don't see what the issue is. You are doing this to yourself.

What does it matter? Leave the employer out of your work history. Problem solved. Or just don't mention being ineligible for rehire.

What is that?

Well that was a mistake -- disclosing that you have smoked pot. What was your reason for doing that? Many people have smoked pot. However, most people when looking for jobs or professional licenses don't go around volunteeering that information. It doesn't make sense to do so.

Sue her.

That would be a convenient interpretation. However, no one would let it slide if the positions were reversed and the OP used the expression "old timer" when arguing with someone else who was experienced in the field. People would flip out and call it ageism in a second -- which is what this is.

They have no way of finding out without the OP volunteering this information. How would they find out without getting a subpoena for every hospital in the state? This is another case where honesty is not the best policy. Do not mention your diagnoses or inpatient stay in your application. They can stick you in a monitoring agreement if you do. Why would you even consider answering this truthfully? It can only hurt you, not help you, and cause unnecessary alarm. The question is designed to exclude people from licensure.

Why are you being so rude as to call the OP a kiddo? How do you know how old she is? Nice ageism. Get over yourself -- seriously.

Job hopping is a silly term used by those who have at one point or another felt "burned" by employees who stopped working for them because other employers were offering enough of a better deal in terms of compensation, schedule, or advancement opportunity, that changing organizations or departments was the most logical thing to do at the time. Expecting anyone to stay in a job that has less to offer than another job that they can get for no other reason than some misguided sense of loyalty is rather insane. If employers feel that they are burned by job hoppers over and over and over again, then in all likelihood they are not providing enough incentives for people to stay. In other words, they probably aren't great places to work, either because of the conditions or because the employer doesn't want to spend money giving people raises. And in those cases, they deserve to be burned by job hoppers for not being worthy enough to retain employees who would want to stay for a long time. You get what you pay for. The more people who job hop, the better.

This guy was writing bad checks, which cost other people lots of money. Knowingly writing bad checks is just like fraud. Having cancer sucks, but that doesn't mean you get to screw over other people.

A lot of people do a lot of things that aren't okay. That doesn't mean they need to be referred to the feds. Why refer them to the feds, if you can educate the person and they stop on their own?

Ruby Vee: you have posted a highly inordinate amount of threads criticizing new nurses, orientees, and "job hoppers" year after year after year. It's starting to come off as somewhat obsessional. Chip on your shoulder much? Just looking at your signature suggests you have a bit of a complex here...

What's stopping you from making the "demands" regarding weekend, holidays, etc that your millennial coworkers are making? What they negotiate with their employers is their business. If it bothers you that these millennials are demanding certain concessions from their employers, and are successfully getting them, then maybe you should do the same. Otherwise you just sound jealous of their youth.

So.. get hired for a beside or clinic position at a hospital then apply to the OR as an internal candidate?

Lol. There's no need to report this stupid video to the feds. I think someone might be taking themselves a little too seriously. Just calm down. OP: talk to your friend first. Educate her on why this is a bad idea. See how she reacts and go from there.

Wow, reporting her for that is premature. Talk to her first, tell her it's a violation of patient rights. If she says she didn't realize that it could be seen that way and will stop, then what good will it do to report her? If she says she will continue to do it anyway, then sure, report her.