Quick Question..

mindyfromcali · Sep 19, 2012

No, not as far as I know. They can ask, but they can't keep you there after your shift is over. Sounds like whoever manages staffing there sucks.

Kitsey · Sep 19, 2012

They can mandate at my facility(WI). Normally it would be the person with the least seniority who gets stuck being mandated for the next shift, but I haven't seen it happen to much. Normally someone volunteers to stay or they work short. Now, getting mandated for a weekend shift happens almost every week. For that, people must be mandated by Wednesday and they take turns running through the staff so it's not always the same people.

bankssarn · Sep 19, 2012

It depends on staffing. If you're the only CNA on the unit, you can't leave. Who would care for the patients? When I worked as a CNA, I had to stay over all the time. We had a log and kept track of mandatory up-staffing. We were supposed to rotate, but the same people always ended up staying.

shix · Sep 20, 2012

Wow..I had no idea we could get mandated to stay. My situation was different. I work 11-7 so that night we had a full house with only 2 cnas - its a hospital ward - with two 1:1 which makes the acuity high. However, there were 4 workers scheduled for days and 4 of them showed up, two getting assimilated into the 1:1 which left 2 on the floor...the team leader not even a CNA himself. So a pt. apparently was going out of the unit and so the charge day nurse tried to make one of us (my co-worker and I) to stay. I had school to attend and she was dropping off her grandkids to school. So our charge nurse decided to stay back and do morning checks while one of the day crew took the patient out. However, this same day charge nurse has once before told me and another co-worker then that it wasn't a choice and one of us had to stay. Luckily he did. So this other CNA who's been through nursing school came up the other night to do a 1:1 and when she heard my story, she seemed to be of the idea that only nurses could be mandated according to their license...but not CNAs. So confusing...I emailed the unit manager and I guess I will read her response tonight when I go back to work.

funtimes · Sep 20, 2012

I think it depends on where you work. At my last job CNAs were mandated if someone called in sick and no replacement was found. I ended up doing a double shift at least once a month. Where I work now CNAs arent mandated. We are often asked to stay over, but they cant force us to. RNs however are mandated. This isnt in Texas though.

It may be the case that in a hospital RNs can be mandated simply as a patient safety issue. Imagine a few RNs call in sick and no replacements are found. You cant simply leave sick patients to fend for themselves, and its not like CNAs or other unlicensed staff can take their place.