Members are discussing the importance of renewing nursing licenses on time and sharing personal experiences with license renewal processes. Some members highlight the consequences of not renewing on time, while others share tips on organizing renewal documents. There is also a conversation about the potential disciplinary actions for working with an expired license and the importance of taking responsibility for license renewal.
I messed up. My RN license expired 5 weeks ago, and I just realized it yesterday. I've been working on an expired license for 5 weeks!
I know that it is my responsibility, and I dropped the ball. But here are my excuses: I currently work in occupational health as a contractor. In the past, my manager would alert the staff as to when their RN license was about to expire. No such entity exists at my current job. Also: I moved recently. I didn't recieve the renewal notice for the BON. (I also didn't alert the BON as to my change of address, so there you go.) Again, I understand that these aren't valid excuses, and I feel really REALLY stupid.
I'm up to date on all of my CEUs. I'm going back for my BSN, so I have tons of credits. There have been zero issues with my license in the past, and for what it's worth, my current job can be considered "Nursing Lite". I do not give out meds or treat patients. I essentially take vital signs and give hearing and vision tests. I do sign 'RN" after my name, and I know that it is necessary for an RN to do my job, however.
My question: What kind of penalties can I expect? Is there anything I can do or say to the board that might help? I have the ultimate goal of becoming an NP, and I don't want a mark on my license to keep me from getting accepted into an NP program. I love my job, and I don't want to get my employer into trouble or make any waves.
There's a whole thread about nursing nightmares. The "I haven't seen one patient all shift" dream is common; it's certainly the one I've been plagued by. I haven't had the expired license dream, but there's always tonight!
Okay, I'd love to read that thread. Anyone have a link?
I always renewed timely, but realized that my hospital didn't check. They knew when everyone's licenses lapsed, kept a spreadsheet on it, but they had zero method to follow up on this and as a result they really didn't know.
So I took a little trip to the hospital risk manager's office and told her that I had renewed (showed it to her) and wanted to do an experiment as to how long it took the nursing office to ask me. I asked her not to tip them off, and she agreed to a short term. I don't know if she found anybody out of compliance in other ways, but I do know that it was more than three months before they asked about mine in the course of checking everybody in the house. Then I told them I had been to RM.
In my state, RNs renew December of even years and LPNs December of odd years. My manager starts hanging reminders in October so no one will miss it. But my hospital is VERY strict about it checking and making sure you have renewed. And when Jan 1 rolls around and you haven't renewed, you don't get to work.
With all due respect: you have no idea what my specific job entails.
I'm helping to develop a software system for tracking employee records for the facility where I work. It's a big job and it will take a month or so. You don't have to be an RN to do that part of my job.
Based only on your posts on this thread: you sound like a bully. Nobody likes bullies.
With all due respect... you don't know be from Eve. Accusing me of being a bully is laughable.
I keep this amazing binder that organizes everything for me and I can look through it easily by year and month of expiration dates. Here's how it works -
You need 1 large 3-ring binder.
Divider tabs labeled by number. 1-24 is what I have.
Put the tabs on the binder in the following order:
15
7
8
9
10
11
12
16
1
2
3
4
5
6
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
13
14
All tabs 13 and over are for years. If anything expired 2013-2014 and you want to keep it, file it under year of expiration.
All tabs 1-12 are months. You will note that the current year (15) is at the front, with remaining months behind it. So everything still yet to expire THIS YEAR is behind the 15 tab with the month tab. Behind 2016's tab, each tab for month will go one at a time as each month ends.
Now take every license, CEU requirement and certification and file it behind its corresponding year tab and if applicable, month tab.
This binder I also use as my portfolio for professional and academic records, including resumes I've used and details of clinical experiences.
This thing is my nursing binder. If my house goes down and all living things are safe, I'm going after my binder and my iPad. :)
Consider yourself lucky you went into nursing. In EMS, if a Paramedic or even an EMT forgot to renew their license and still remained on the job, there would be a news article which would make the newsfeeds everywhere. The company would then face penalties from the insurances and Medicare for failing to provided a licensed person at the patient's side during transport since you technically are not licensed after the expiration date. The company may even have to make a public apology and assure the public everyone is still safe since they are part of Public Safety and EMS which means being held to a higher standard. For the professions (PT, OT, RT) mentioned in another discussion about billing, besides the hospital, each of them might have to answer to the insurances. At least nursing seems to be very lenient.
Your hospital has a serious problem if it allowed this to happen. There should be some type of reminder for license expiration.
Hospitals are supposed to have a system in place to track this, and the hospitals are at risk of penalties if they get caught. I worked as a hospital surveyor for my state and CMS for several years, and part of a full survey is reviewing a random sample of nursing (and physician) personnel files. If expired licenses are found, the hospital gets cited. The catch is that hospitals v. rarely get full surveys and know that, and they get lazy.
Most (all?) of the places I've worked over the years, you get reminders in advance (which, personally, I've always found kind of insulting) and, then, the day that your license expires and you haven't renewed, you get taken off the schedule and told not to come back until you have a current license. That's how it's supposed to work. Nursing is not universally lenient.
I just got back from the Board. Everything was fine. My license was activated while I drove home. The person from the Board was very understanding and professional. "You're not the only one who has forgotten to renew on time, but don't let it happen again." I know that I am very very lucky.
That said: Some of you guys are rough! I think that nurses are fairly notorious for being hard on one another. I also think that nurses have a reputation in taking a fair amount of self-righteous joy when other nurses make mistakes. In part, I understand it. Nurses have a very important job, and mistakes can quite literally cost patients their lives. But I think that a little perspective as to the nature of the mistake is important. I am also probably being too sensitive. But my point stands: We should strive be kind to one another.
Thanks to all for the advice. This won't happen to me again.
Most Boards of Nursing have a grace period built in but you can't worry about this, call them TODAY and get it taken care of.
If you don't get it straightened out, you are not only going to be out of a job, you'll be kicked out of your BSN program because you have to have a valid nursing license to stay in.
Horseshoe, BSN, RN
5,879 Posts
Okay, I'd love to read that thread. Anyone have a link?