Scheduling Vent

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Hi. Prepare yourself for some major whining :)

I am new nurse... 6months out.. Well in March I was diagnosed with having narcolepsy. I'm not to the point of falling asleep anywhere, but I get very very tired and could easily go to sleep but I can make myself fight it. Well I originally worked night shift, and my doctor wanted me off of nights, so I could get myself a set sleeping pattern, rather than it all messed up... So I go to days.. Only problem with days is in the policy it says that day shift must cover night shift as needed, blah blah... My unit manager tells me that it might be one every couple of months or so... I figured I can deal with that.. It is hard, but I will do my part... Well one every couple of months has turned into EVERY schedule and two or three nights in a row.. I have discussed this with her many times, and to my face she says she understands and will work with it, but on the schedule is a different story.

This schedule she has me 5 days in row, one day off, night shift, night shift (12hrs), and another night... Keep in mind I only work 8hr shifts... Do you think a written note from the doctor telling them no nights would work or is there anything I can do... And how can she schedule me for a 12hr shift when I don't do 12s.. Noone does..

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Yes. Get a written note from your doc. Give copies to your nurse manage AND employee health. The employee health department was so paranoid about getting into lawsuits if they had even the smallest chance of exacerbating an exisiting condition of an employee.

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, educator.

Where I work, if you have a rotating position, then you rotate. There are several people I work with that have health conditions that rotating makes worse, but they have to do it or lose their job. I don't think it is right, but they don't have to make an exception for anyone.

As for the 12's...that is really unfair. I would go to human resources and complain about that.

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But you would think with the Disabilities Act, they have to make some type of adjustments.. I haven't asked for much, just that IF she must schedule me on some Nights, to just do one at a time, not two or three in a row

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Definitely bring in a note documenting the problem. I believe that they are supposed to accommodate those (within reason) who have such problems.

The note is the first step, though. Do that and see where it goes from there.

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, educator.

I believe that you have to be declared disabled to be able to claim anything under the disability act. Where I work, they will try to work with you, so they claim, but they will usually only go as far as to tell you to go to a straight off shift. I work with 2 girls that are pretty brittle diabetics and when they rotate they have a hard time, but they have to do it or go to an off shift.

Our rotators are pretty lucky, they only rotate 25% of their time over a year.

My suggestion is to go to human resources, see what your options are. Where I work, employee health wouldn't do a thing...they don't even handle job injuries, pink eye or anything...it seems the only thing they do is TB tests and flu shots :uhoh3: Can you offer to do something like work every Friday or some other sort of deal so that you don't have to work as many rotating shifts? We have had some people do that (ie I'll work every Friday 3-11p). I hope things work out for you!

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Thanks.. Narcolepsy is considered a disability, and I was offiicially diagnosed with it..

We I went to days she informed me that we must cover other shifts, and she said it would be a rare thing, maybe one shift every schedule or even less.. That I can handle, it is hard, but I can manage.. But 3-4 night shifts in a row is pushing it, if I was gonna do that I should have just stayed on nights...

I go back to work on Wed and I am gonna talk to her.. I am also going to go to one of the clinics here and get an application.. They have RN positions in oncology, neurosurgery and family practice, and they work Mon-Fri 9-5.. And I hear they start nurses out at no less than what I make now.. I hate to leave the hospital, but if it means I feel better then I guess its worth it..

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