tips on organizing and keeping up in nursing home

[jlee1887]

hello,

i work at a nursing home which once was a 5 star facility, since then they have switched owners....and needless to say it has went to Sh*t!!! its terrible...especially the communication between nurses, switching shifts, and just having too much to deal with with no help! one of the halls at my facility is just falling apart...we have permanent set full time nurses on each hall or each shift...well this one particular hall lost the full time evening shift nurse leaving that spot open to a brand new nurse...who has no idea how to run and manage your hall with..mind you 30 residents on... so basically the day shift nurse just could not keep up anymore, the new nurse hasnt a clue! theres orders on the mars and tars but no orders on POS and or TOs ....med errors galore... then they fall behind on their scrips for narcs and end up running out cant refill untill the MD is aware they need a new one...sent to pharm then wait for it to arrive! ugh so what im looking for are any ideas tips? on anything to get this hall under control? like new reoprt sheets? or protocols for new orders or anything!

[Khaos RN]

This sounds just like my facility! We have a nurse on the evening shift that gets so behind on her one hall that when I walk in it's crazy. People are still up at 10:30, medications have not been passed, blood glucose not even done yet, so insulin is behind too. We also run out of narcotics and no one has sent the script to the doctor, yet night shift is left to do all this. It's like day and evening shift don't pass any narcotics?

I spend a lot of time going through new orders and making sure everything is correct. I correct those errors myself and I have found it's not any use to make the DON aware that these mistakes are being made because no one seems to care. Perhaps the DON needs to have an in-service so that everyone is on the same page? Communication is so vital, but sometimes overlooked.

Long term care is tough. Everyone has to work together, but I find that it's every nurse for themselves in my facility.