Abby Connolly
Have you ever worked a job where you’ve experienced how chaotic a “short-staffed” day is? When there aren’t enough employees working in a day, work conditions can become a complete nightmare. It’s especially brutal when medical centers are short-staffed.
One nursing assistant recently told her manager she couldn’t pick up an extra shift and later got a very unexpected visitor at her door.
She is a 24-year-old certified nursing assistant. She primarily works in a chain of surgery recovery centers in her city. Each center is run by her boss, who is a woman in her late 30s.
Recently, there’s been a shortage of nursing assistants and healthcare workers. It’s been heavily affecting her workplace and her personal schedule. Normally, she should be working 12-hour shifts.
But with the shortage and employees constantly not coming into work, she’s been working back-to-back 16-hour shifts.
During the winter, she didn’t mind the extra work, as she didn’t have much going on and needed the money. But as spring came around, she’s been feeling burnt out and desperate for a break.
One afternoon after one of her night shifts, she got home around 2:00 pm and was ready to get some much-needed rest. Suddenly, she received a call from her boss, demanding that she go back to work in the next four hours because they were too short-staffed.
She told her boss that she couldn’t go in. She was too tired to drive and, therefore, too tired to care for residents. Then, she told her boss that she should cover the shift herself.
Her boss got very angry and threatened her, telling her that if she didn’t go in for the extra shift, she’d be written up for patient abandonment.
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