RN positions at Sunrise Assisted Living

tbanurse · Sep 22, 2008

I just completed several years as Healthcare Coord. with Sunrise. The two positions you are looking at are very different, so that's the first thing to be aware of. HCC is a salaried position (= more hours worked than paid for, and on-call 24/7) while the wellness nurse is a part-time (usually weekends only) hourly position. Depending on the community you are looking at, you will most likely be the only nurse, responsible for the health and wellness of anywhere from 70-100 residents. You will supervise unlicensed personnel who pass meds (aka Medication Care Managers), be responsible for the medical aspect of the resident's care, coordinating care with outside providers (Hospice, PT, OT, ST, case managers), communication with MDs regarding change of condition, med changes, communicating these changes with families, assessing all residents prior to move in and at regular intervals, oversight of the medication program, training of staff on resident care, and the mountain of reports/forms/charting required by the state and corporate office.

The job as HCC is very demanding, requires hours beyond the 9-5 that they may tell you about (you can count on the first 6 months being 12 hour days), and can be very stressfull being the only nurse for all of those residents. Many of these residents are very frail (aka as skilled nursing -type residents), and the biggest majority have some form of dementia (yes, even on the assisted living side!). Many of the frailest residents really do belong in skilled nursing, but you will not be able to admit that! Your regional team will make you find a way to keep them within your community and care for them. With that being said, it was a great place to work (depending on the Executive Director), and I developed great time management and conflict resolution skills! The key really is how well you fit in with the team, so when you interview, ask them lots of questions about how you would interact with them and what your role would be in relation to theirs.

The other thing...

You may want to look at the company porfile on any of the financial boards to get some insight on the company and its fundamentals. It has had some major financial issues for the past several years, and with all of their recent changes, it is looking more and more like they will be sold to another company to improve their overall status. At one point within the last year, they were so far behind on their accounting, that they were only days away from being de-listed from the NASDAQ. There have been some restructuring moves within the company, voluntary separations, all in order to make it more "productive." It is a very large company which has had issues with the bottom line and it's ability to maintain its customers. It is all out there on the financial boards for you to find.

Just out of curiosity, which community are you looking at?

Good luck!

tbanurse · Sep 22, 2008

Oh, and by the way...

Sunrise has only recently started hiring RNs in the HCC position--they have traditionally been filled by LVNs because California does not even require assisted living facilites to have a nurse! Because of that, the pay for RNs is typically much lower than other positions that you will look at. If they can not find an RN willing to take the pay that they offer, they will hire an LVN for that role. I did make a good salary for an LVN, but I would not even consider going back at what they offer the RNs. They do offer fairly decent benefits though.

carol72 · Sep 24, 2008

My friend worked there for about a month. She mentioned they pay poorly.

Best Wishes