Pros and cons of closed unit

Zee_RN, BSN, RN · Oct 10, 2000

I work in an 18-bed ICU. Currently, we are only pulled to the Telemetry Unit. The other night, they attempted to pull one of our nurses to Med-Surg and were presented with pending resignations....they withdraw their request...

Many of our nurses state they will NEVER go to med-surg, aren't too happy about going to Telemetry but accept that....But times are changing as well all know...so, we'll see what happens

crystalrn · Oct 11, 2000

I currently work on a closed unit in a local hospital. We have been open units in the past, and personally I was very dissatisfied with the open unit policy. What happened to us was that our small twenty bed unit was usually staffed well, but the larger med/surg units were running short unually everyday. So someone "got pulled" to go to another unit, almost everyday. We started rotating who would go, but it is still frustrating. The unit I work on is rehabilitation, so we would sometimes run our unit short so that our staff could go to acute care. I think that each unit should be responsible for staffing their unit adequately. It is not unreasonable to be short staffed occasionally, but if it happens on a consistent basis, then maybe the staffing situation needs to be readdressed. The pro's would be that most staff would be crosstrained to work in various areas of the facility, and would be able to provide quality patient care on whatever unit they we pulled too.

ratchit · Oct 16, 2000

I used to be a pretty darn good M/S nurse. I haven't worked a floor in 4 years and wouldn't begin to presume to know how to do a M/S nurses job now.

A floor nurse isn't expected to walk into my SICU and be able to competently care for patients- why is it assumed that I can go to their world and practice safely?

Besides the fear of a lawsuit for taking an assignment I am not competent to handle, there is a profession- alism and morale issue. I don't think I should be expected to help another unit out unless that unit is able to help me out, too. If I volunteer, then fine. But most hospitals assume they can use ICU nurses as house floats but leave the ICUs short routinely because other areas can't cover us. Makes no sense.

I am in favor of closing units or at least working in clusters- e.g. float to MICU/SICU/CCU only. Most places include ER and sometimes PACU in those groups- but they shouldn't.

Don't mean to come across as disgruntled- I really love what I do. But our employers wouldn't expect to cover a sick call in HR with a float from accounting. Why are we expected to work outside OUR knowledge base?

Hmm- there's a possibility- we should have a nursing exec cover accounting or HR for the day. We could tell them "you use similar equipment, the corporate rules are the same... the other accountants are there for as resources.. I don't know why you're complaining...." Ahh, in a perfect world...

dinorn · Oct 16, 2000

i work in a closed unit (women's services)we do not get pulled to other floors. we are cross trained to l&d,postpartum,nursery and these are the only units we are required to work. we do take call 2 to 3 times a month.i have worked open units in the past and was dissatisfied being pulled to med/surg or telemetry. being on call a few times each month is well worth not being pulled outside my specialty area. we do not get paid for being on call unless we are called in then we get an extra $50 for each shift we work and can work a max of 16 hours. the call schedule usually works out well and our nurse manager tries very hard to find coverage so that she does not have to utilize the call schedule. you would need to have your core staff otherwise you would be taking call more frequently.