Shortest time you held a nursing job?

RNMBA · Aug 31, 2003

Five shifts.

The attitude's of the nursing staff were so bad I wanted to scream. We just don't have to put up with that.

CseMgr1, ASN, RN · Aug 31, 2003

Originally posted by Quickbeam
They were really put out and I was told to see the chaplain about my hardness of heart. Anyhoo, that was also when they told me about the 150 person med pass I'd have to do twice a shift. Eat my dust! I was outta there.

Hardness of WHOSE heart???

Who was this facility accredited by? Dakow??? :eek:

ratchit · Sep 1, 2003

I took an every other weekend charge job at a nursing home a few years ago. A resident got out of the building and onto a busy street, naked, on Saturday. I directed the CNAs to keep him under constant supervision, whoever and however they wanted to, switch people off, whatever they wanted to do- just keep him in sight. They complained to management, I was overruled. Same day, same guy got out again, we had to call the police to find him. It was snowing. He was OK, but only because we got very lucky.

Sunday- a lady who knew how to shut off her bed alarm got up, fell, and had a nasty compound wrist fracture. The doc wouldn't call me back. I sent her to the ER without an order. When she got back, she had a growing bloody stain on her cast. I called the ER to ask what they did to stop the bleeding- the nurse gave me a hard time then went and asked the resident about it. She came back and said "I was not there when they did this but they put a 4x4 over a bleeding (small) artery and casted it without suturing it. The attending is ticked- send her back now." Again, the doc wouldn't return my calls so I sent her without orders. That was my second disciplinary action of the day.

I gave 12 days notice- just enough to never have to step in the door again.

crazedredhead · Sep 5, 2003

4 weeks, and only that because I gave 2 weeks notice. It was an ADON position at a really run down nursing home. The residents were packed 4 to a room, some of them, and talk about bizarre situations that arise. The building was so run down, I had to check the plumbing for 60 residents on first rounds, to see if the potties flushed. Then, I found out that, although there were sinks in every room, there hadn't been any hot water for 8 years!!!!! All the CNAs were toting water down the hall. I asked why...Oy Vay! Then, when the maintenance guy checked, it would seem that someone had cut off the water at each sink. When they fired up the boiler, it crashed and burned.

So, this particular corporation just doesn't care about anything but the bottom line. If you want to know more, just email me at [email protected].

katscan · Sep 10, 2003

If these are the horror storied from just the people who have read the thread here and responded, think of how many MORE stories there are out there. It's just too depressing. And people wonder why those great nursing positions are open and why there is a "nursing shortage". There really isn't one- No, just a shortage of people who want to be abused!

lalaxton · Sep 10, 2003

About 3 months. I worked in a LTC facility that had great pay and good benefits until I found out that the Director of Nursing and her Assisstant were sending staff home early and compromising patient care was so that they would qualify for a big bonus!

It's all about the $$$$$$$ !!!!!!!!!

asil · Sep 10, 2003

I worked as a nurse case manager for 2 months. I found the job to be boring, but the people were nice. It just was not a good fit for me.

pghfoxfan · Sep 11, 2003

I have been working about a year at my present job as an Electro Physiology RN. Prior to that I worked 17 years in a Cardio Vascular ICU and fresh out of nursing school in Pediatrics for 3 years.

MrsK1223 · Sep 11, 2003

I did 4 days in a nursing home. Hated it! Believe it or not I was in a desperate situation and it was all I could find. I cried every evening after work and literally ached head to toe bad from never having sat down and from the stress of being thrown into a wing with 30-40 pts and me being the only extra RN with one other RN and an LPN and aids...didn't see one around when I needed her. I didn't give notice, I just handed my key and badge in at the front desk and never looked back. May not reflect good on me, as that is not my usual character but it was that bad. I didn't care. My mental health was on the brink.

barefootlady, ADN, RN · Sep 11, 2003

3 weeks at a LTC facility. Needed the job but was just too stressed out by lack of everything. Will never do that again!

Mama Val, ASN, RN · Sep 12, 2003

1 DAY

I was 17 years old and had just got my CNA, talked to this nurse about working in the nursing home on the other side of town, which wasn't to far really, she hires me over the phone no problem she says (she allready had my res). Get all dressed up in my whites and go over for my 1st day of orientation and meet another nurse who shows me around. As I look around this "nursing home" I start to notice that all these people aren't that old and they are acting a litle weird. Its starting to really freak me out.

Ok what gives, what is this place really and where is the nurse I spoke to the other day. Now the story gets good, it wasn't really a nursing home but a rest home for the insane and most of those were the ones who had been in jail and the state decided it would be cheaper to farm them out and let someone else assume the risk. Then she tells me the first nurse I had talked to had been attacked while passing meds and had her jaw broken by one of the "clients".

I am outta here babe, my Mom says I can't work in a nut house. I left and never went back, warned all my friends who I went to school with just in case they tried to trick anybody else.

Owney · Jan 3, 2004

A better question for me is "what is the shortest time you ever saw somebody do your job.

I got my RN license and my first RN job the same month. I started as a staff nurse in the ER of the biggest level 1 trauma center in town. Back in those days it was unheard of for any specialty area to hire any nurse without 2 yrs med-surg or at least a few years LTC experience. So among the seven of us, I was the only one too stupid to realize how rediculous such a job really was. On our first day one gal didn't come back from lunch. Another one didn't come in the next morning. Another one didn't last the week. One lasted about three weeks, and after 6 months I was the only one left.

The last ER I worked at was such a hell-hole, it must take the prize. One night I saw a pool nurse who remembered me from downtown. She said, "Oh goodie, Owney works here--if he likes it here, I know I'm gonna love it!" She was gone after 4 hours, which was the minimum sentence her agency would allow. In the same area one night, Barb and I saw an new agency nurse in full-blown tears after getting her first report. 5 minutes later, Barb and I looked over there and she was GONE!

I am highly amused but rarely shocked by the horror stories from LTCs. I once was delivered an elderly gentleman who had had his scrotum cut off. I was amazed to see both of his testicles hanging by their cords, with no evidence that there had been skin covering them. I asked the guy, "Sir, what happened to you--were you in a fight?" "I don't know, I musta been."

"Well, it doesn't look like YOU won!"

My charge nurse called the NH and spoke in Takalog to the charge nurse there. She said, "Oh yes, he's a terrible resident, always going around trying to pick fights with everybody!"

I filed a recipient rights complaint in that case. I got copies of the state investigator's findings for months and I got several years' education in LTC. The charge nurse worked her last shift that night. The interviews of the CNA's were most enlightening. They said, "We are only allowed 2 diapers and 2 blue pads per resident each shift", and of course that is why the man got "decubitus", instead of some *ssh*l* just saw his chance to flush the old bugger's scrotum down the toilet.

I heard that they shut that place down for other reasons after the investigation I started was completed. The owner just opened up a worse one down the block.

So when I'm in the old nurse's home, I hope I don't poop my pants more than twice a shift or my scrotum might fall off!

:roll