New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

GemRVN — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 21:56:56 GMT

Ah rota's... currently the stress in my life.

We will soon be a 3 nurse and 1 very brand new nurse team. We currently are at 4 nurses (2 RVNs and 2 almost RVns) and have 3 nurses in the morning, 2 in the afternoon and 2 in the evening. This tends to mean one of the nurses works from 8.30 - 7pm. But all this will change in 3 weeks when one of the RVNs goes on mat. leave leaving us with 1 RVN 2 almost RVNs and 1 complete newbie who starts college in September for 2 days a week. It's going to be fun but we plan to stick at 3, 2 and 2.

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Emma Fletcher — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 23:08:08 GMT

Hi,

We have 6 nurses working when we are fully staffed. When we are down to 4 nurses the following rota applies,

8-4 - Early nurse / In patients, 8:30-4:30 - ops (consults 2-4pm), 9:30-6:30 - consults, 11-7 - late nurse/ in patients, 1:6 weekends

Everyone rotates each shift daily, generally if your the late nurse the following day your the early nurse. And when we are fully staffed you dont work any lates after your weekend.

Hope it could be of help,

Emma

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Anne Whipple RVN — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 10:38:11 GMT

We have an 8-3 (on ops), 9-5 (usually reception), 10-6 (float) and a 2-8 (or close, whichever's later) and then we're on 1 in every 5 weekends (all weekend and you're on the late shift Fri night if you're on the weekend). If someone is on hols we skip the 10-6 shift. Usually works out pretty well.

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Phrin Vernon RVN — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 22:42:28 GMT

I have seen a 4 nurse rota work as follows:

Week 1 - Ops 8.30-5

Week 2 - Ops support - 10-6.30 Tues-Thurs, 11- 7.30 Mon & Fri

Week 3 - Inpatients/Pharmacy 8.30-5

Week 4 - Pharmacy/ Reception cover - 10-6.30 Tues-Thurs, 11- 7.30 Mon & Fri (This also included working at a branch surgery Mon, Weds & Fri 2.30-4.30pm, half hour drive away, so plus lunch hours, that nurse was effectively out of the rota from 1pm - 5pm)

One in 4 weekends meaning 8.30-12.30pm Sat, on call Fri night - Mon morning, plus in for a couple of hours on Sunday morning for cattery / inpatients. Vets saw to the inpatients for the rest of the time.

Receptionists - there were 2, and they did 1 in 2 Sat mornings.

Wasn't an ideal set up really

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

zara — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 16:50:34 GMT

in my old practice we had 4 nurses

the 4 shifts were

7.30 - 4 kennel shift

8 - 5 float nurse

8 - 5 ops nurse

10.30 - 5.30 late nurse

each nurse would have there set days e.g. -

mon - kennels

tues - float

weds - ops

thurs - late

and on fridays it will change every week

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Jables — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 09:56:28 GMT

[quote user="Elvira"]Our Saturdays are different as we have a nurse who always does Saturdays[/quote]

This is what used to happen! Our ANA used to work reception on saturdays, but he's got the trainee nurses job, and we're not replacing him, just changing his hours so he shouldn't have to do every Saturday any more.

How does everyone feel about split shifts? I'm lucky with my hours anyway... at my ols practice we did a split shift 8.30-12.30 followed by 3-7.

[quote user="Elvira"]All shifts are on a daily rotation[/quote]

How are everyone else's shifts arranged? I think ours are on a week at a time to allow trainees (there will be 3 of us, and 1 QVN) to get a full week at a time in each area. Is it hard to keep track of a daily rota? This would help avoid us having to do a fortnight at a time on lates, or every other week on lates (the inpatients are the kennel nurse's responsibility overnight too!), but I wonder if they'd go for it?!

Nurses meeting where we decide all this is tomorrow :-S

Thanks you lovely lot!

JB xx

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

BengalcatRVN — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 18:09:21 GMT

Shift changes are always fun! I'm quite lucky in a way, 1 in 4 full weekends, and my bosses allow me to select my days off (providing it doesn't clash with others holiday) I usually give them 4-8 days to pick from.

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

littlehays — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 16:24:19 GMT

cor those hours sound lovely!

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Lesley Stinson — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 15:51:58 GMT

When I worked in a previous practise we had 4 nurses.

2 qualified and 2 trainees

Qualified shift’s were 7.30am – 2pm + 1pm - 7.30pm

Trainee shift was 9-2pm + 2 – 7.30pm

If you worked a late shift you were on the following morning for the continuity of patients.

The qualified nurses over lapped for 1 hour and this was to pass on the cases that were in

If you were on the weekend then you worked the late shift Friday and the early shift on the Monday morning. ( this also meant that you had a long weekend if you were off)

A qualified nurse and a trainee nurse was present for sat 8.30am – 1.30pm

This worked out very well as the trainee’s got plenty of time to see different types of practise ie surgery, kennels, reception, consultation, nurses clinic and discharge and also plenty of time for study

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Tomo — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 14:48:54 GMT

This sort of thing is sooooo annoying.

I have just started a job after relocating from somerset to cornwall.

I thought we were ding a 4 week rota with a one in 4 weekend rota, with the folloing friday off if we orked the saturday.

We are now going to a be working a one in four weekend rota but with no following friday off. So annoyed as though this would give me more time to travel back to somerset..

Also there was no mention of this when I went for my interviw.

thnakfully its not being put into action unti septemebr. then i think i will reassess y plans and go from there.

Re: New nurse, new shifts?! What would you do?

Elvira — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 14:17:30 GMT

We normally have 7 nurses but one is pretty much always on holiday and one is off (day off, part time or days in lieu due to weekend duty), so we rarely have more than 5 on a rota. When we have 5 we have 2 early (7.30 to 3 or 4), one mid (8/9 to 4 or 5pm) and 2 late (11 - 6.30). When we are reduced to 4 nurses, for whatever reason, we have 2 earlies and 2 lates. All shifts are on a daily rotation, so you could have 2 earlies, 2 lates and a mid in a week or any other combination, depending on who's available or not! Our Saturdays are different as we have a nurse who always does Saturdays, so the rest of us generally do 1 in 6.