Screening your phone calls?

Nurses General Nursing

Published

  1. Do you screen your phone calls against your facility?

    • 87
      Yes, always!
    • 10
      No, never!
    • 22
      Occasionally

119 members have participated

All right, fess up. How many of you screen your calls against the facility where you work?

Here's my story:

I have been on vacation since last Tuesday, and I'm scheduled to go back tomorrow. I got called twice yesterday by my facility asking me to come back early (today). The second call, my supervisor asked me to come in for my annual evaluation today -- it takes all of 15 minutes, and I had to go out for another appointment anyway -- so I agreed to that. I went in today in search of my supervisor and encountered several of my coworkers (who were having a very busy day), one of which was kind of ugly to me when I asked if she knew where our supervisor was. I let it go, chalked it up to them being busy and I know they knew I had told my supervisor yesterday that I could not come in to work today. Long story short, I found my supervisor, finished my eval, and booked it out of there.

I'm scheduled 7-3 tomorrow - I got a call a short while ago from the house supervisor telling me (*telling me*) to just plan on staying until 7pm tomorrow. I could not find my call schedule, but I suspect I am the on-call nurse for 3-7pm or 3-11pm tomorrow. I have no doubt that this is in response to my being on vacation for so long, when they just happen to be busy, and I dared to tell them I couldn't come in when they called yesterday. (What was I thinking?? :trout: )

These people just can't stand when certain members of our staff take a vacation. I rarely ask for more than 2-3 days in a row (usually just a single day here and there), and this time I asked for 10, and it was granted. But, at the same time, there are a couple of "senior" nurses that take vacation all the time - one of which takes no less than an entire week EVERY SIX WEEK SCHEDULE. And nobody says anything. It'd be different if I was totally inflexible with my schedule, but I switch days around and stay over all the time, but come on! How much are we supposed to give?

Now, I think the only thing I did wrong here was answer the phone, knowing it was the hospital. Half the time, when it's the hospital on the phone, it's really my best friend (a doctor that also works at this hospital) calling me for one reason or another. I'm thinking of telling her if she calls me on a hospital phone to expect the answering machine.

Anybody else have these issues? (I'm sure many of you do, but it's aggravating as *fill in adjective here* when it happens...)

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Specializes in Onc/Hem, School/Community.

I'm still an aide. This is the first facility I've worked at that I don't screen. That's because they are encouraging my education advancement to an RN and know I have class(es) and can't come in.

Prior to the great place I work now, I ALWAYS checked the caller ID. I don't want to hijack your post so I won't go into any details......but I feel your pain. Good luck to you.

P.S. A vacation is a vacation is a vacation-no matter how much of your earned time is taken at once. If they approved it, your phone should not have to scan your calls. JMHO

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I have started to check my caller ID to see who's calling. I work dayshift as an supervisor and there is a PM nurse that calls for the stupidest stuff. I swear that I get a headache from just talking to her. I am not "on call" anymore though I will stay over to help out and occasionally work a shift on the floor.

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Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.

I always screen my calls. It's really annoying to see the work number pop up on my caller ID, on my days off, and the message left on the machine is "hey i saw where you had call tonight, hey can i have it?" or "hey wanna trade days next week?". I don't call people on their days off, i don't want them calling me on mine (and i've even told people this, but apparently they don't listen.)

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I am not yet working at a hospital but I do know what it's like to get those calls on your days off. There is nothing more annoying. And yes, I almost always screen my calls.

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Specializes in Long Term Care.

I work PRN for this one facility. They called and left a message, after i had already told them i would be out of town for the Week, that I was needed at work right now, as soon as I could get there.

:roll: i was tempted to dress and go clock in, just to be annoying.

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Specializes in psychiatric ER, Mental Health.

I hear this. I can't imagine what it is going to be like when I am a nurse. Currently, I am home~ post op. I did call them to tell them that I made it out of the surgery alive, you know, just to be nice about it. I really hate taking time off of work, it is usually more to go back to than it is worth. But this time I HAVE to take it. Well, they were nice enough to keep me on the phone for about 20 minutes going over things that I went over with them LAST WEEK before I left. They called me last year after a surgery too, not to see how I was doind but to ask a question about how something needed to get done. I am taking all of my time I am entitled to at this point. Too much stress to go back to soon when no one really cares.

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Right now I'm a SAHM so no-one calls me to come into work (well maybe my kids when they stay the night at grandma's house and they want to come home early), but back when I was working I would scan my calls about once a month. We had a girl who would always call in "sick" around the same time and I got to know when she was going to be "sick" so I would scan the calls so I didn't have to work for her.

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I'm thinking I probably didn't ask my question correctly -- I think we ALL probably check our caller ID before answering the phone. ;) To rephrase, I guess what I'm asking is how many people look at the ID, see that it's work and say "ha! yeah, right.." I've done that a few times in the past but lately I've been good and answered the phone anyway, thinking it could be my friend calling me, only to find it's people I work with calling me.

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Specializes in Nurse Scientist-Research.

I've gotten home after vacation and found 4-5 messages asking me to come in. I don't answer calls from my hospital (have caller ID) unless I hear the message being left and need to talk to the person; such as once a nurse called to verify something I wrote on the Kardex that wasn't clear.

A previous facility I was working at was experiencing a very tough staffing period and told us that if they called us and talked to us and their need was bad enough we would be required to come in or face disciplinary action (with no on-call involved, just people on their days off). That's when I quit answering my phone, allowed my answering machine to take all calls (didn't have caller ID then). I also recommended this to all my fellow workers. I'm not sure how legal that was but I didn't work there long after they started that mess.

And for all that is holy; do NOT feel bad about taking your full 10 day vacation that was granted through the proper channels. Also I don't think there is anything wrong with taking a week off every 6 weeks if that is what is alloted in your facility. I know where I work you have to use your PTO to get paid 100% for it. Otherwise it is paid at 50-80% depending on why it is being cashed out.

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Specializes in Pediatrics.

I always screen against the hospital calling... unless it's a day that I'm scheduled to work, and they are trying to call someone off for low census. I have been known to listen to the message and if they sound desperate enough, call back a little while later. I know if I actually answered and talked to them, I'd cave and I can't work THAT often or I'd go crazy.

I do often get phone messages when I've been out of town, when I get back, to come in and work some night I was out of town and they knew I was. Oh well...

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Specializes in Med/Surge, Psych, LTC, Home Health.
I work PRN for this one facility. They called and left a message, after i had already told them i would be out of town for the Week, that I was needed at work right now, as soon as I could get there.

:roll: i was tempted to dress and go clock in, just to be annoying.

I'm confused; how would this have been annoying? Seems like this was exactly what they wanted you to do?

But, in response to the last poster... yeah, that's usually the case with me. I generally don't pick up the phone when they call unless it's about an hour and a half before my scheduled shift and they are calling. They are probably trying to get me to take call, because the census is low. They never actually call people OFF unless the census is VERY low, and the number of persons scheduled is VERY high.

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