was i unprofessional? (quick story)

[raindrop]

I several years experience as charge nurse and I think I always handle people and situations quite well. However, at my current place of my employment, the first person who shows up for the shift is the charge nurse. Quite fine by me, but I've noticed a couple women who love the power trip of being charge and the other day it finally got to me. I show up for work and noticed that me and another nurse only had 8 patients assigned to us, whereas, the charge nurse assigned herself 11. I also noticed that we had 5 open beds. I voiced my concerns because it was clear to me (as always) that the other nurse and I were going to get the 5 admissions and the charge nurse won't have any, because she was already at her max. She disregarded my concerns and the shift began. Yep. right away, the other nurse and I each got 2 admissions. And then ED called to give us the 5th patient. This is where I put my foot down. I told, yes, TOLD the CN that she would be taking the 5th admission. She said NO, because that would give her 12 patients. I told her she can give me report on one of her current patients as I will take over their care. She huffed and puffed and pouted, but ended up taking it.

So by the end of the shift, I ended up with 11 patient (2 admissions and her spillover patient); the other nurse got 2 admissions = 10 patients....and the charge nurse had to give up a patient to take an admission, for a total of 1 admit and 11 patients.

Was this professional of me to grab the bull by the horns like this? I was very matter-of-fact, yet, professional......if that makes any sense. I wasn't ****** about it. I told my boyfriend about it and he thinks I was unprofessional....

[RNnbakes]

11 to 1 ratio, is this a restaurant?

[wooh, BSN, RN]

Well nurses are just hospital waitresses these days. Might as well be a restaurant.

[Anna Flaxis, BSN, RN]

I echo the sentiment that an 11:1 ratio is ridiculously unsafe. My mind is officially boggled.

Every place I've worked, the charge nurse is like the captain of a ship. She or he has to know what is going on with every single patient on the unit, know every single policy and procedure inside and out, be available to everyone from the staff nurses to the house supervisor to the physicians to the family members, and not only make assignments for their own shift, but look ahead to the next shift and call in extra nurses if the census increases or if there are call ins. The charge nurse is the Jean-Luc Picard of the inpatient (and ED) unit, and needs to have a broad body of nursing knowledge and nerves of steel. The charge nurse simply cannot take a patient load and be effective in their role, let alone as a new grad with six months' experience.

Now, I have had some great charges that will jump in and help with admits, med recs, bedside tasks, and even take an easy patient or two, but in general this concept of a "charge nurse" in name only who takes a full load is foreign to me.

[MsBlissful]

THIS IS WHY... I retired from bedside nursing 5 years out of nursing school. Its BS.

[blondy2061h, MSN, RN]

It's just insane to me that charge is based solely on who gets there first and someone with

[locolorenzo22, BSN, RN]

OMG. Run, don't walk, to your state BON and report this unsafe staffing. How do you do anything on time in that shift? I get 4(maybe if I have a fresh post CCL patient) 5 if I don't. I REFUSE to go higher than 5. unsafe for me to chart, catch errors, take care of people, etc.

I worked years on a ortho floor where you would walk in at 5pm and have 5 patients, 1 on the way, and by 11 you'd either have another admit or take over 1 from the "charge" that left at 1130. post ops and medicals. total crazy some nights! I couldn't imagine that staffing.

Get out of that place and protect your license. Your hospital is using you!

[seizetheday]

Of course professionalism is not limited to nursing. However, you will find that most nurses here (in my experience) are hoping to relate to/vent to/ask advice of those who actually know whereof they speak. For instance, would you return to your other industry positions in order to ask nursing questions of your former co-workers? I would think that you, with your multi-career background, would understand more than anyone that nursing is a unique profession with extremely unique working conditions and situations. I would no more ask a carpenter his/her opinion on nurse/patient ratios than I would ask a lifelong bachelor for parenting advice.

"The carpenter was not presuming to comment about clinical matters, but about the topic of the thread: whether the OP acted unprofessionally."

Interesting....how does one guage "professionalism" when one is clueless about the profession, except perhaps by virtue of being married someone in the profession?

I also found it extraordinary that the carpenter responder in question didn't hesitate in more than one response to correct spelling & punctuation, all the while that his posts contained spelling & punctuation errors.

I have been a nurse for 12 years and I disagree with this attitude. Yes, there are unique aspects to nursing but there are unique aspects to every single job you can have. It doesn't mean that there aren't commonalities that run across jobs, including nursing. Professionalism is not specific to a profession. There are context specific applications of professionalism but that doesn't mean that someone who isn't a nurse can not in any way understand professionalism. In my hospital the required workshops on professionalism are given by HR, not nurses. If someone who was a engineer told you they walked up to their boss, spat in his face, swore at him and ripped up the blueprints he was holding would you really say that you have no idea if that was professional or not because you aren't an engineer?

Having worked in professions other than nursing I will say that in my experience pretty much every profession goes home at night feeling as though others don't really understand their job. And nurses can work in homes, schools and clinics, in hospitals and communities, with babies, teens, adults and elderly, as a team or independently - there is really not one definition of what a nurse is. In my opinion, nursing really isn't that special in terms of being a profession, it has its own unique and shared qualities just like every other profession.

And P.S. - you just did the same as what you judged the carpenter for - pointed out his spelling errors while making spelling errors of your own.

And I've had some non parents give me great parenting advice, sometimes they can see things from a perspective that is without a bias or feeling of comparing/competitive that other parents can't. Many people go to child psychologists, pediatricians, teachers etc... not all of whom are parents and definitely respect their advice related to their child.

[Mulan]

OMG. Run, don't walk, to your state BON and report this unsafe staffing.

What, exactly, is the state BON going to do?

[cherrybreeze, ADN, RN]

I would no more ask a carpenter his/her opinion on nurse/patient ratios than I would ask a lifelong bachelor for parenting advice.

Of course not. However, the OP wasn't asking about nurse/patient ratios, s/he was asking about the professionalism of their actions.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

As always, it's not bad enough we spend all our time at work being told how to be nurses by people that aren't nurses. We come home, try to commiserate in a safe place, and still have a bunch of non-nurses telling us how to be nurses.

[OCNRN63, RN]

I have been a nurse for 12 years and I disagree with this attitude. Yes, there are unique aspects to nursing but there are unique aspects to every single job you can have. It doesn't mean that there aren't commonalities that run across jobs, including nursing. Professionalism is not specific to a profession. There are context specific applications of professionalism but that doesn't mean that someone who isn't a nurse can not in any way understand professionalism. In my hospital the required workshops on professionalism are given by HR, not nurses. If someone who was a engineer told you they walked up to their boss, spat in his face, swore at him and ripped up the blueprints he was holding would you really say that you have no idea if that was professional or not because you aren't an engineer?

Having worked in professions other than nursing I will say that in my experience pretty much every profession goes home at night feeling as though others don't really understand their job. And nurses can work in homes, schools and clinics, in hospitals and communities, with babies, teens, adults and elderly, as a team or independently - there is really not one definition of what a nurse is. In my opinion, nursing really isn't that special in terms of being a profession, it has its own unique and shared qualities just like every other profession.

And P.S. - you just did the same as what you judged the carpenter for - pointed out his spelling errors while making spelling errors of your own.

And I've had some non parents give me great parenting advice, sometimes they can see things from a perspective that is without a bias or feeling of comparing/competitive that other parents can't. Many people go to child psychologists, pediatricians, teachers etc... not all of whom are parents and definitely respect their advice related to their child.

The majority of the nurses who post here are looking to communicate with other nurses, not lay-people. If I start a thread here about some sort of difficulty I am having with my job, I want input from other experienced nurses, not bar tenders, carpenters, waitresses, etc. I have no actual proof, but my gut feeling tells me that most other nurses here feel the same way.

[OCNRN63, RN]

As always, it's not bad enough we spend all our time at work being told how to be nurses by people that aren't nurses. We come home, try to commiserate in a safe place, and still have a bunch of non-nurses telling us how to be nurses.

This.