Rest Pay

[GarretSTL]

I would like to survey O.R. nurses from all around the country and see who does and does not get "rest pay" or compensation for working overnight on call.

For example, the first O.R. I worked in offered a guaranteed 8 hours away from the hospital. Thus, if we worked until 12:30 in the morning or came in on call and worked until 4 am we would get a guarantee of 8 hours off (8:30 am and 12 noon, respectively), all of which would be paid starting from what our normal start time (6:30) was.

At the hospital I work at now there is no compensation whatsoever. So last night I worked until 8:30 pm and then got called back at 1:30 am and worked until 4:30 am. Now I will be expected to work my regular shift that starts at 6:30. They will do what they can to get me out early today but when I leave I won't get paid for any lost hours.

Please weigh in on this and let me know what your facility does in these situations.

[dianah, ASN]

It's not an unusual practice.

When I took call we were expected to work our regular tour of duty post-call, no matter how long we had worked or when we had been called in the night before.

Compensation is the OT received from being called in and "call time" for carrying the pager/being on call (got paid for being stand-by).

No, it's not optimal.

We didn't have the staffing to do it any other way.

Perhaps you can come up with a plan or proposal for the person to start his/her post-call tour of duty later in the day?

Or come up with a couple of alternatives to present to your Admin?

[Rose_Queen, BSN, MSN, RN]

What dianah said. My manager will do her best to get us out for the next day, but sometimes the case load and staffing issues don't allow for that to happen. When we are able to leave, we have to use our paid time off balance to cover the shift since it's not a preplanned absence. The compensation for the extra work is viewed to be the pay- time and a half, 2 hours minimum each time called. So, if I were to stay an extra 30 minutes to finish a case, I get paid 2 hours time and a half. If I get called back in but have the case cancel, I still get paid 2 hours time and a half. Those crazy nights where we work all night long don't happen very often, so it's a trade off I'm willing to take.