well they closed down a floor of the hospital

[ohmeowzer RN]

well last week they closed down a floor at my hospital for lack of patients. we are being called off and cancelled because the other floors have to accomidate nurses from the floor that was closed. i don't mind being called off. it shows how bad the ecomony is. how are things at your hospital?

[sxybuttrfly]

my unit closed a week before christmas- and we are still closed!!!! however, interesting enough, my unit's staff seems to be the only staff working?! our unit's staff is floated from one unit to the next as if to cover the entire hospital for the holidays. it seems as if our unit closed not for low-census purposes, but for "closed for the holidays" so that icu/er/med-surg staff could be off to enjoy the holidays at home. i say this, because on several nights, it has been our staff and our staff alone that have worked these holidays, with no other staff to guide us/assist us in for the most part unfamiliar territory! the combination of units icu with step-down overflow, med-surg with step-down overflow is rather chaotic, especially without much to little guidance from experienced m/s nurses. and it seems no one could give us a criteria for re-opening... even when 8 out of the 11 patients in icu met our unit's criteria as well as 11 out the 18 patients on the m/s unit! i just will be more than ecstatic when our unit re-opens and we are back home!

[abundantjoy07, RN]

Yep, our floor has been closed for about 2 weeks with another week to go (we are thinking). I've been floated all over this big hospital. I finally just took my stuff out of my locker and carry my lock with me as I know I'll be floated from one floor to another every day. I think 6 other units are closed down too. It's frustrating, but at the same time it's a great learning experience for me. Eventually I will be ready to head back to my floor tho. 5 more days to go!

[Tait, MSN, RN]

We closed our 7th floor back in May I think it was. Our unit got moved downstairs and all the water and electricity was shut off to the top floor. It happens, but at least are units are full most of the time now, and we rarely get called off.

Tait

[Valerie Salva, BSN, RN]

The economy will have an affect on corrections. My guess is crime will go up! Criminals getting desperate, heck even regular people becoming desperate and looking for other options.:zzzzz I'm sure the prison industry will be doing much better than the auto industry.

Sounds reasonable, but I recently saw a report that a number of states are looking at closing prisons because of budget short-falls. If you google "prison closing" a number of current articles come up.