This is the reason that hospitals are bleeding nurses. If they tried to get out and it was truly unsafe, it is unreasonable of the hospital to expect them to risk their lives. I have spent many hours at work in the hospital due to blizzards in the past because I lived close and believed that those who lived further away should be safe. They always showed up as soon as they could.
I am so thankful not to work in a hospital anymore.
If caregivers are not cared for, there will be no caregivers.
I wonder if there is a history of union-management clashes at that hospital leading up to this, and nobody is wearing a halo.
Also, in the heart of Bummer country with ACORN and SEIU... to see something this precipitous is just plain strange. I’d expect to see months of back and forth.
At the hospital where I work , they will send a cab to pick you up if you cannot make it in due to a storm.
It is unreasonable to expect someone to risk their lives if they are not experienced and confident with driving in the snow.
That is why the cab pickup is such a good idea.
The hospital pays for the cab.
Didn’t I just hear on Rush this week that the mayor of DC said that some people were going to have dig out their streets themselves? I think asking people to do the friggin’ street is a bit much. Being from DC, and knowing the inability of the city to deal with 5” of snow, much less the amounts they got, how can they punish people who couldn’t get into work?
How were you going to go thru unplowed streets? The Metro was closed for some of the storm and only the underground portion ran for some of it. C’mon people. Are all hospital employees considered necessary emergency workers? Is it in their contracts that you get fired if you don’t come into work? I dunno. Seems a bit heavy handed.
Ditto!
There were times I couldn't in any way, shape, or form make it...every route was flooded out, or snowed under.
Other times, it was somebody else, and those of us there, STAYED there, until others could make it in and relieve us. Sometimes, it meant we still stayed in an unoccupied room, instead of trying to get home & come back.
OTOH, we were in a rural area, without any meaningful public transportation.
Bless you for everything you do. My sister is a (retired) RN and she has echoed your sentiments to me many times. Between the lousy treatment nurses receive from the hospitals and egocentric physicians, I don't know why anyone would bother.
I work in the high-tech sector and my rule of thumb has always been that if I earn more in a day than my insurance deductible costs, I will risk going out in lousy weather. If my deductible is greater than a day's pay, I'm probably gonna sit it out!!
It's not like this was a sudden, unexpected storm. They knew it was coming, and they knew it would be bad, and that the roads would be impassible, and they knew they would be required to be there regardless. In that case, prudence would dictate that they make arrangements beforehand to come in with a suitcase and sleep over in the hospital, or to make arrangements with somebody to take over their shift.