At the end of March, Governor Tony Evers signed an executive order that loosened licensing restrictions, making it easier for retired, out-of-state, and student nurses to jump in and fight the COVID-19 pandemic....
Sounds like a real emergency. Hair On Fire and all that, right??
Nope.
...All the nurses who spoke to FOX6 News work in departments that slowed down after elective surgeries were canceled. Many health systems took this step weeks ago in an effort to stop the spread of COVID-19.The hospitals would not "train" the nurses on Chinese Virus procs, nor on some computer system, so the nurses are excess baggage and get dumped on the side of the road.
Elective procedures are typically how health systems make the bulk of their revenue.
"And basically after that all happened, we were told that we were now not needed because they didn't want to train us to work in different units or to do our new computer system that we have," one of nurses said.
Nurses called FOX6 News when their hours were cut; on Friday, several received unpaid furlough notices....
KUDOS to Channel 6 for running against The Narrative. Keep it up!
Nurse to patient ratios have been high for decades. On a typical day on a med-surg unit RN's have many more patients than they should have. Administrations keep their staffs so tight that with the slightest tick up in patients it put the nurses in an unsafe position, not to mention the patients. Close a unit, reduce nusing staff. There is never enough nurses because that's the way they want it.
ReplyDeleteAdd to that the fact that the RN exam is a gateway which screens a lot of people OUT of the RN designation. Scarcity keeps prices high and the hospitals react accordingly.
ReplyDeleteIt's obviously stupid to dump RN's in the street and at the same time go all hair-on-fire about "need for more personnel." That line was re-played tonight by some MCW or County official.