Night nursing question

[Alliestallie]

Does your agency pay a differential? Ours doesn't (b/c the state doesn't) and therefore it is impossible to get people interested in working nights.

Nights is actually less work w/ dd, as I would expect it would be with many kids.....more observation and less doing. It would be about two hours coming on w/ vest, cough assist, trach care and getting her set up for bed. Then 8-9 hours of sleep on the vent. Then another two hours in the morning, just reverse. No more night feeds and minimal suctioning during the night, some nights none.

If no differential, have you been able to come up w/ anything to entice someone to work nights? The nurse we had switched to nights when dd started school, but it lasted only three nights before she quit (lots of issues). She made bows on the side and I had told her that I had no issues w/ her doing that while dd slept....she stayed awake and alert and got side work done. Win, win.

[kadiera]

Our current night nurses *prefer* nights. Two of them have younger kids, and they switch off with their spouse to minimize child care. The third is a grandmotherly type who prefers quiet midnight shifts for crafting; she feels it's her job to ensure her charges are asleep and doesn't do all that well with earlier evening shifts and getting Alexander to bed.

A former night nurse of ours was working her way through a masters degree - she's now the NP that runs vent clinic at our pulmonologist's office.

[IzzyB]

We have had issues with night nurses too. To make matters worse ours is a tough night case. So many nurses don't want it because they can take another job that they can sleep on or is way easier and get paid the same. We are really lucky we got a regular nurse that doesn't mind the work and seems to enjoy working with our LO. The issue is finding a nurse the 3 nights she is off. We have gone through so many nurses. Either they don't like taking care of our LO or we don't like them. While the shifts get filled, we still don't have someone on a regular basis we like.

[tbhartman]

I had trouble finding nurses that wanted to work longer night shifts. One of mine complained when it bumped from 8 to 9 hours a night! (All of which he slept!) She only needed/wanted 32 hours a week for insurance, no more. If she wanted a job, she took the 9 hours LOL!

Maybe part of the issue is having such a long shift? maybe you could bank two hours a night and turn it into having an extra evening/day shift?

[IzzyB]

Our nurses are the opposite. Most of them feel it is not worth it if it is not a 12 hour shift. We would loose our regular nurse if our 12 hours were cut back.

[Alliestallie]

Originally Posted by IzzyB

Our nurses are the opposite. Most of them feel it is not worth it if it is not a 12 hour shift. We would loose our regular nurse if our 12 hours were cut back.

We've got 60hrs/wk. Dd goes to school (nurse on campus and competent 1:1 para) and has PCA care (w/ me here!) aft/eve and weekends. So all 60 could be split into 6 10s or 5 12s....I have no preference.....I just need some SLEEP!

[bdarling]

On a good night, Will is the same routine as your DD. Except with feedings and meds - but he sleeps MOST nights.

Our agency pays differential. I found out when our day nurse, who was a LPN, mentioned the night nurse made over $10 an hour more on a weekend or holiday. This was between the LPN/RN difference in pay scale and also the differential for the night.

It is strange b/c a good night Will sleeps through everything - repositioning, meds, diaper, feeding machine beeping for change to formula. A bad night is A LOT OF WORK for night. The day nurse has to do much more physical stuff (transfer, bath, into stander at school, etc), so it is tiring on a good day. The bad day is just like at night - but with the heavy lifting.