Weather Policy

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Does your hospital have a weather policy? If so, is it lenient? Do you ever feel like you have really sacrificed your safety to make it into work out of guilt?

Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
However, there are obstacles to having "sizable per diem pools". It is expensive to train, maintain competencies, communicate changes, etc to people not here that often.

That's a really good point...just the other day there was a nurse who came in, my first thought was "wow, I haven't seen her in ages." She is a really good nurse, unfortunately she was totally unfamiliar with the some new wrinkles in the charting system, she was not aware that there were changes to how the Pyxis worked, and she was not familiar with how how we revamped our report with the floors.

Either way, we have have a quite large PRN contingency for our ER, yet there are very few times when they are able to come in at the last minute to cover call offs as they all have responsibilities outside of work (be it kids, a first job, or life).

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
People die if nurses call in during weather emergencies? Cut the drama.

On my previous unit, the night shift was working quite short because of calloffs thoughout the hospital (not due to weather). A post op CABG pt got out of bed during the middle of the night. One of the nurses was already off the unit taking a pt for a stat head CT after a fall. No one answered the CABG pt's bed alarm. She was found, dead on the floor, with her chest tube pulled out. Is the hospital partially to blame? Sure. But, I think the large number of nurse call offs played a role in it.

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Specializes in Leadership, Psych, HomeCare, Amb. Care.

Either way, we have have a quite large PRN contingency for our ER, yet there are very few times when they are able to come in at the last minute to cover call offs as they all have responsibilities outside of work (be it kids, a first job, or life).

Exactly. I have a pretty large PRN staff, and it's still sometimes impossible to find one of them to come in.

And in cases of a weather emergencies when your regular people are having trouble getting in, the likelihood of PRN staff agreeing to work is pretty small.

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
No health care professional should be working with the flu. That's irresponsible.

Well, that may be true, but I though we were talking about the weather, not the flu? But I have do have to agree with Sionainn--I have never experience an ER doc call of for bad weather (and there is a lot of it around here), never heard of a surgery cancelled because the surgeon couldn't make it to the hospital, etc.

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Specializes in Med/Surg/ICU/Stepdown.
On my previous unit the night shift was working quite short because of calloffs thoughout the hospital (not due to weather). A post op CABG pt got out of bed during the middle of the night. One of the nurses was already off the unit taking a pt for a stat head CT after a fall. No one answered the CABG pt's bed alarm. She was found, dead on the floor, with her chest tube pulled out. Is the hospital partially to blame? Sure. But, I think the large number of nurse call offs played a role in it.[/quote']

So this alarm was just going off and none of the nurses ran in there to answer? ... not even a PCA?

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Specializes in Med/Surg/ICU/Stepdown.
Well that may be true, but I though we were talking about the weather, not the flu? But I have do have to agree with Sionainn--I have never experience an ER doc call of for bad weather (and there is a lot of it around here), never heard of a surgery cancelled because the surgeon couldn't make it to the hospital, etc.[/quote']

I have seen MD's cancel surgeries that weren't emergent for less than that.

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
Well, what a superhero he is.

And if I have a dissecting aortic aneurysm, I darn well want my CT surgeon to be that superhero! (not to mention OR nurses/staff, ED doc and nurses, etc...)

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Specializes in Oncology.

We had an attending and a resident call out due to weather. I asked another resident what happened to the guy who called out and the resident looked at me all confused "we divided up his patients of course." When I clarified, "no what happened to him, personally, was he disciplined?" The resident looked at me shocked, "he couldn't get in, what was he supposed to do?" Considering a resident can get his ass handed to him for muddling through rounds after a 30hr call I found this very telling. Didn't bother to ask about the attending.

I think it's clear that some hospitals have better inclement weather policies than others. I like the 'code white' policy. I know the hospital my mother worked for during the Loma Prieta earthquake (yup, she went in, worst night of my life. I was 8) was pretty good too. She and the other's who showed up got overtime and a thank you luncheon. Nothing happened to those who didn't come in. My hospital seems to be fairly unprepared, so I have two options 1) change hospitals or 2) one day work for upper management and change things. I like option two, and I hope 'well I made it to work when I was at the bedside...' will never play into my decision making.

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
So this alarm was just going off and none of the nurses ran in there to answer? ... not even a PCA?

Not to get this off topic, but, in short, no...one had called off, the other was with the nurse in CT.

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Emergency, Trauma.
Yes, thank you! I know it's typically customary on this site for people to find the one person they don't like and lash out at them, but sheesh ... this post had an actual purpose, lol.

Pardon me, but most of the time it's NEVER personal...if it was personal, it's violating TOS; if you taking it personal, then remember that we all have opinions to express...it's fair game when you respond specifically to ones quotes; what do you want us to do, stay silent???

MY answer is: :no:

That's the nature of the Internet for over 15 years; and human nature of the human condition well over centuries. :whistling:

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Emergency, Trauma.
Not to get this off topic, but, in short, no...one had called off, the other was with the nurse in CT.

That is awful :(

I think we do have to be mindful regardless of weather; leaving a unit short can increase mortality; while there are people who are working in this business to combat safe staffing, in the meantime, we STILL have to be there for our pts; they REALLY do depend on us. :yes:

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Specializes in Med/Surg/ICU/Stepdown.
Pardon me but most of the time it's NEVER personal...if it was personal, it's violating TOS; if you taking it personal, then remember that we all have opinions to express...it's fair game when you respond specifically to ones quotes; what do you want us to do, stay silent??? MY answer is: :no: That's the nature of the Internet for over 15 years; and human nature of the human condition well over centuries. :whistling:[/quote']

Listen, just because it violates the TOS does not mean it doesn't happen. There are plenty of ways to make it a personal attack against someone without being out out about it. I see so many posts that essentially call people out, picking unnecessarily at their opinion, and blasting them for feeling how they feel. It's not even funny. And those posters are so transparent, it's sick.

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