Screwed over?

[MP RN, RN]

So, I am a male RN, have been nursing for a little over 6 years now. My fiance I met in school, and she is an RN as well. I consolidated in, and continued to work on a surgical floor after graduating, and after 2 years of getting our feet wet, we decided to move to a smaller, almost rural type hospital that has about 55 acute care beds, a 1 floor of people awaiting placement and LTC.

When we applied at this hospital, my fiance went on to work in the ER, and I applied to work the surgical floor. This small town hospital was literally ecstatic they were able to grab 2 young RN's at the same time, and they basically told us we could work anywhere we wanted.

4 years ago I was orientated to the surgical floor. Now since this is a small hospital, the surgical floor is also the Labour & Delivery floor. There are about 400 deliveries a year here, so sometimes there's 2 or 3 preggos on the floor, sometimes none at all. The floor requirements are, a minimum of 3 L+D RN's at all times (night and day shift both), but there are always 4 RN's for both shifts either way.

After 6 months or so of working, I was asked if I had interest in training to work the L+D aspect. I replied no, it's not really my interest. Which was fine, no issue was made of it. I have worked part time for the past 4 years now- getting almost FT hours. I am now #3 in seniority for the part time staff on my floor.

Trouble is, hours are drying up. They have created a few extra FT spots, so PT hours suffer. I have had a few cheques with 20 hours or less on them. This isn't good, b/c we bought a house a few years ago.

My fiance has a FT spot for over a year now, and I applied for the latest FT posting on my floor. All the job postings I have ever seen always state requirements are both surgical and L+D. There is 1 other RN on my floor who does not have L+D training; she has been working here for 2 year longer than I have. We do not work the same shift together. She also just finished a temporary (1 year) fulltime spot for one of the girls who was off on pregnancy leave- and now works part time like I do. Anyway, Human Resources contacted me, feigned not knowing I had no L+D experience/training, then DENIED me the position, stating I didn't meet the necessaries in the job posting, and I would need to have L+D training in the future to accept any fulltime spot.

So I approached my unit manager about being denied the fulltime spot, and she basically told me "I need my L+D complement". I replied, even when I'm working, you have it. I am the 4th RN, there are always 3 L+D girls working with me no matter what. She replied she has to pay overtime whenever one of the L+D's I am scheduled with calls in sick.

I basically asked her outright, do I have a future on this floor beyond the part time spot? I asked, how did I even get accepted to work on this floor if I had no L+D experience 4 years ago? I said I felt taken advantage of, because if they would have told me when they were first interviewing me 4 years ago, "you can work PT but we'll never hire you FT- unless you get L+D trainining", obviously things would be different. Now I have 4 years of part time seniority on the floor I love, and I can't use it for anything. She offered me to work FT on the medical floor- I don't want to even go into that- that floor is such a poor work environment it's not even funny. I respectfully declined. So, I am basically doomed to work part time on my floor unless I take the Labour and Delivery course and start working that aspect.

I should note I have my neonatal resuscitation training always up to date and current.

Another thing that leaves a bad taste in my mouth is, I have applied for the last few FT postings, and my manager has known about it, but said nothing to me. Those positions were taken by PT girls who were ahead of me in PT seniority. It is only when it was basically my turn to get the FT spot, and I approached her about being denied, that my manager even bothered to tell me I would need to do that training to get FT. I had my staff review with her about 6 months ago and even back then she said nothing to me about it, despite knowing I had been applying for FT positions. She even told me how much she loves having me work on the floor and how I'm a good role model and she appreciates that I am willing to work as charge nurse when they call in sick. She states she feels so confident when I am working b/c she says my assessment skills are so great, and blah blah blah, she went on and on about loving me during my staff review.

So, do I have a right to be upset about this.. or should I just suck it up? I am pretty sure I will lose any grievance filed, b/c I don't have the qualifications (L+D) for any job position posted on my own floor. Yet somehow I've worked here for 4 years without a problem.

[OttawaRPN]

Well, it sounds like you got caught in some rightsizing which now has you as the "odd man out".... Pardon the pun.

I do understand your argument, and it's perfectly logical and legitimate from an employee perspective however, management generally doesn't make accommodations for one staff member unless it's advantageous for them in the long run. If they've decided that the nurses on the unit from this point forward need L&D training, not only do they have to demand this requirement from new applicants to the facility but also need to "upgrade" the existing staff. "If we make exceptions for one, we'll have to do for everybody." will be the reasoning. They're looking at the big picture, everyone has to be on par, otherwise their attempts at micromanaging becomes too complicated, inefficient and financially irresponsible.

From the details you provided, it sounds like you don't have a grievance standpoint. You mentioned the last F/T was taken by P/T with more seniority - which is the way it should be - and that the real issue is management didn't give you a heads-up on the added requirement before these available postings came and went despite having ample time and opportunity to do so. Were they required to do so? No. Should they have out of courtesy and niceness? Probably. But in my experience, the words "courtesy" and "management" simply cannot be used in the same sentence.

The way I see it, you have several choices:

a) go head and comply... get the L&D training (it sounds like you're doing the job anyway so why not just appease them?) If L&D is really not your cup of tea, you probably shouldn't be on a unit that has so many deliveries.

b) take yourself and your accrued seniority to the medical floor. Is it bad because you heard it was bad? Maybe you should form your own opinion.

c) what about the other units in the hospital - LTC or ALC or ER?

d) and last but not least, you may just want to leave the hospital. How many nurses have left a facility not because of work related issues but unreasonable bureaucratic nonsense? I would venture MANY - including myself. You mentioned it's a rural hospital - any other hospitals nearby? I work at two rural hospitals and one urban one - the shortest commute being 8 mins and the longest commute being 1 hour. Maybe you should start considering other options?

Hey... good luck! Keep us posted on the outcome.

[MP RN, RN]

In response to:

a) I have zero interest in working labour and delivery.

There are a lot of, shall we say, rural and/or mennonite families who start having kids at 15 years old. Not my cup of tea... and up until the last few minutes before delivery, the L+D nurse is back there by themselves (they ring a loud buzzer or call on the phone when they want the backup L+D nurse to join them).

b) I have already worked on the medical floor; I have picked up the odd shift there over the years. The air conditioning is broken, and since this is a small hospital, every single patient that requires isolation is over there. Every single private room, and usually every semi-private room too- are always full of MRSA, VRE, CDiff, (or some combination of all 3).. or some other pt that requires isolation. On top of being the hottest floor in the hospital, you are constantly gowning and gloving and sweating your ass off. I have a 3 year old son at home, and while I don't mind working there occassionally when warranted, I won't put myself fulltime into that and risk bringing it home to my little one. The floor has a horrible turnover rate not only with RN/RPN's, but also has had 3 different unit managers in the 4 years I've worked there. It's a mess. The morale is terrible, the management admits the A/C doesn't work, but over 4 years the answer has always been, "we're looking into it" (aka, it probably doesn't fit the budget to fix the A/C in a 50+ year old hospital). Pt's, staff, families have complained, and nothing has changed.

c) the other options. This hospital has a funny rule of, "family members are not allowed to work together". It makes sense in a bank to me, but a hospital? Since my fiance shares ICU/ER, I can't work in either of those departments. That leaves Medicine (out of the question), LTC (if I wanted to work nursing home type job I'd apply at one), Day Surgery (everyone applies there for the 7-3 shift, it will be many years before I'd have the seniority to get in there), and OR/RecRoom. OR/Rec is what I'm leaning towards... but I have to take the OR course obviously, and then I would start part time, as well being on-call. I can handle that. It's likely what I will do.

d) I was PO'd enough at being declined, and felt taken advantage of, that I considered it. The next hospital is a fair commute though, and I really love my coworkers. My fiance loves her job as well, and we'd likely have to sell our house, uproot, etc. It's a high cost to pay as a family. I am preferring to avoid that type of thing.

[Fiona59]

When I started reading your post, I thought "the poor guy is in Comox" but then realized you're in Ontario.

It sounds likes the OR is in your future, I'm afraid. But if you have a type "A" personality you should do fine there. Being on call for the OR isn't as bad as it sounds, there is usually a schedule for who gets which weeks. Plus there is oncall pay, etc. Look into staying on the Surgical unit and being casual in the OR, would that be an option?

[OttawaRPN]

I think you answered your own question - it seems you'd only be satisfied with an OR gig. At least until something better comes along.

I hope it all works out for you!

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

it sounds as if you were offered the opportunity for l & d training and you refused. if the manager wants all of the nurses to have l & d training and you don't, then you're not really qualified for a full time position. sounds as if you're going to have to get the training if you want to stay -- if you haven't already burned your bridges in that position.

[tarahope]

Like my friend said, why not take the training that the facility provided? Sitting in the room and still get paid is feeling so good. After got the training, people have more opportunities jump to another better facilities to get more pay.