Respiratory Therapist question

[macizu, BSN, RN]

I live in Houston , TX and I'm just curious as to what the exact amount starting salay is for new grads? Could anyone please give me a number of what new grads are coming in with, I'd really like to know what their numbers look like?

Also is there extra pay for shift differential and for working nights and weekends, how much, a dollar or what?

Also what about getting overtime? How do large hospitals handle too much overtime by employees (including RN's)? The reason i ask is because I think that i'd want to work more than 3, 12 hour shifts a week. Could i work 4 or 5, 12 hour shifts a week? Anyone know of people who work this much and how the hospital feels about it?

Once again, thank you very much for taking the time to read this far, I really do appreciate it.:wink2:

[stufnsuch]

My husband is a Respiratory Therapist in NH. Depending on where you live, you make VERY different pay. He began 10 years ago around $16 in WA state at one hospital and $20 at another...and a year later we moved to NH and he was making close to $19/hr...he would guess starting pay would be closer to $20 now.

As far as overtime goes...that all depends on if they have it. Most hospitals don't want to pay overtime if they don't have to...it comes and goes depending on need. So if you're trying to get into something that is going to guarentee you overtime...it's not going to happen. 3 twelves are pretty common...so you would really only be getting 36 per week.

Shift differential is something most hospitals will have...after 3pm between $1.50 and $3.00 an hour depending again...where you are. Weekends I believe are $3 more.

Hope this helps...

RN's will make more money if that's what you're trying to compare with. Good Luck!!!

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

I can't talk about the pay rates in Houston, TX, but I was a manager and can tell you about differentials and overtime. Many facilities do offer some kind of differential for the off shifts and weekends. Each rate is different and based on what kind of need they have for nurses. I knew of places that offered as much as $5 an hour for every night shift hour worked and as little as 50 cents an hour in addition to your base pay.

When I was a manager one of my jobs was to keep overtime of the employees under my management to a minimum. My director of nursing was a real bear about it. There was one nurse on my payroll who was collecting huge paychecks because she was picking up extra work on any nursing unit in the hospital that she could get and working almost every day of the week along with the bonuses she got for working our Baylor plan. She was cleaning up. I had to make sure that the extra time she was working was not getting charged to my unit, but to the unit she did do the extra work for. It became a battle of budget between me and other managers. If they needed her help those managers had to be willing to pay her overtime.

Now, I, personally, would not permit any new grad to work any extra overtime (I'm not referring to those times when you have a scheduled shift that runs into overtime because of unforeseen problems). The reason is because new grads are still in a learning mode. New grads are still learning for their first year of work and letting them work overtime shifts puts them in stress. I personally think that any manager or facility that permit any new grad to work extra overtime shifts like that need to have their heads examined. A new grad might not have the sense to know better; the management staff does. Management staff that would allow this doesn't have the best interest of a new grad at heart. I'm interested in helping to develop a professional nurse not in taking advantage of and getting as much work as possible out of some unsuspecting newbie.

You have no idea of the stress you will be under for the first year of your working life. You do not need to compound it by working OT. Believe me, whatever financial problems you have now will be improved when you start working as an RN. OT can wait for a year or two until you are settled in the job. I would much rather see you wait than have you end up stressed out, burned out or hating nursing which is more likely to happen if you rush the money aspect.

For a number of years when I started out in nursing I worked the night shift. The pace was slower at night and the pay was better because of the differential. People almost always show up to work the day shift. It's not always the same for the off shifts. People sometimes have to stay over to work doubles on the off shifts because of people calling off sick at the last minute on the night shift.

[macizu, BSN, RN]

Thank you so much for the replies. Much appreciated!!