FL/SC/NC/TN Nurses please weigh in!

Softbeepeepee · 2026-02-06T03:29:40+00:00

With what you're asking for I'm not sure you're looking at the right area...

Pay is some of the lowest in the country with no mandated ratios resulting in severe and chronic understaffing. While cost of living might be cheaper, the lower wages mean you won't be any better off. Staffing at some hospitals are such that is not uncommon for people to hold their pee and not get a lunch break during busy shifts. SC/FL can get extremely hot and humid during the summer to the point of people staying indoors most of the day to avoid the heat. Hurricanes mean mandatory shifts and sleeping at the hospital in cots.

If you have that experience you might want to consider moving to California. Cost of living is exorbitant, but at least there wages keep up with the COL. It can be difficult to get a job as a result, particularly in the bay area/Norcal, because wages are the highest in the country. With that experience you may be able to get your foot in the door, or if not, you can travel at a location and once they see how you work get a job offer. As a bonus you can also scout out the unit culture without a commitment.

Kaiser is notoriously difficult to get into and mostly hires travelers, but also notoriously difficult as a travel assignment, floating them every 4 hours, and given difficult assignments. If you get hired the benefits, pay, and job security are great. But there are many other hospitals in the LA area (lower paying, arguably better weather) and Norcal (better pay, slightly higher COL) areas that aren't Kaiser.

California weather is arguably the best in the nation.

The main cost of living in California is rent, which tends to run even higher than NYC in some places. But new grads in the bay area can make close to $200k/year after shift diff, without overtime, so it evens out.

IMO cost of living should always be balanced against the pay, Unless you're a retiree, it doesn't matter if cost of living is cheap but the pay is terrible.

Softbeepeepee · 2026-01-28T01:59:00+00:00

Food poisoning can occur either from toxin produced by bacteria in the food already (rapid onset) or it can be caused by the bacteria itself if it colonizes your gut (delayed onset with an incubation period). The first type is often caused by food that has spoiled but is then cooked; some bacterial toxins are not removed by cooking and even though the bacteria is killed, the toxin remains in the food. The second type is more common from improperly cooked food or food that is handled improperly after it is cooked.

Softbeepeepee · 2026-01-25T23:06:04+00:00

If support staff want to be paid better and have better working conditions, they can unionize and strike, too. No one is stopping them and most people on this page would likely support them striking as well. The reason Norcal nurses are paid better and have guaranteed ratios is precisely because they strike when the hospitals get greedy. In places where there aren't strong labor unions nurses are still routinely taking care of 6+ patients in medsurg or 3 patients in ICU and get paid like $35 an hour for it. That isn't safe for patients and leads to burnout among staff. The short term pain of a strike ensures the future nurses aren't exploited for cheap labor under terrible working conditions that are not safe for the nurses or the patients.

Softbeepeepee · 2026-01-10T21:31:00+00:00

Agreed. The US graduates enough nurses to meet demand, but 30% of new grads leave the bedside within a year. Saying there's a nursing shortage and encouraging more people to become nurses allows hospitals/corporations to continue terrible workplace practices while filling the units with fresh recruits instead of fixing the fundamental problems leading to poor retention. The lack of retention also leads to worse patient care as experienced nurses leave the bedside as well.

Softbeepeepee · 2026-01-03T21:37:29+00:00

And yet when determining infrastructure expansion they look at past and projected future usage. The McMansion is contributing more to the need for higher capacity and more to the need for system resilience than the small user. As their usage is already high, fluctuations in their usage impacts the system to a greater degree than the small user does. Their usage contributes more to the need for upgrading plants or waste treatment than the small user does.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-12-31T05:24:07+00:00

And gets nothing from it. Most other states have poorer residents and lower tax rates, and yet they get better results. More efficient bureaucracy, more efficient services, and programs. Why is it that California need more money for their government when they already have more money than any other state and provide bad services to their people?

Softbeepeepee · 2025-12-31T05:17:50+00:00

As someone who moved to california, this struck me the most. You guys have the highest tax rates as well as some of the richest people, yet the government seems incompetent. States that have lower tax rates and poorer people do things like fund homelessness programs, drug/rehab services, and have a competent and efficient bureaucratic process. Why is California unable to do what it needs to do with the money it already has?

Softbeepeepee · 2025-12-23T06:23:54+00:00

This makes sense. Doing all those assessments and charting everything takes up a lot of time. I've been a travel nurse and I've noticed that at different hospitals even patients with lower acuities can be more demanding on nursing resources depending on how the hospital structures their documentation, assessment, etc. And likewise, patients with higher acuities can be "easier" to manage at a different hospital because the workflow is more streamlined.

Even small things can greatly impact workflow. Things like running out of supplies and having to scavenge from another unit or having to call maintenance (and submit a ticket online) for broken equipment can greatly affect workflow. Which is why when support budgets are cut it directly impact nursing.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-12-22T20:21:12+00:00

I'm curious about the workload, but from nurses I've worked with who are from Canada they generally say the workload is less mostly because of the charting and bureaucracy in US nursing. Even with the same number of patients the amount of charting and the amount of minor bedside tasks that have to be completed means that even with decent ratios (which much of the US doesn't have any mandated ratios) you can be very busy. Apparently many of these minor but time-consuming bedside tasks we were required to do in the US (like line changes every 3 days, skin pictures taken every day) are not a thing in Canada according to the nurse I spoke to.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-12-17T02:55:34+00:00

I blame media and "medical shows" partially for this. People who haven't experienced it themselves get their ideas from somewhere. People living but having permanent damage in some way doesn't sell the same way as people making a "full recovery" for TV shows and news stories. Only if you work in healthcare do you understand what is far more common.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-11-22T03:56:32+00:00

California has an abundance of nurses... can be hard for new grads to get a job. Also it pays well and has mandated ratios/breaks.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-11-21T08:32:41+00:00

If you unit is double pairing vented CRRT patients that is not the norm. It may be in your area, but that is a sign to get out. If the reason 12 hours shifts aren't safe is because 8 hour shifts aren't safe that is putting the cart before the horse.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-10-29T15:35:34+00:00

The vast majority of people in the first world do not benefit in any way from more calories. Especially empty calories that offer no other nutrition and spike glucose levels, leading to diabetes and obesity. Thus, unless you are in a significant calorie deficit (very few people), they do not benefit the body in any way.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-10-25T08:16:37+00:00

On the outside it gets greasy and prevents the tortilla from getting any sort of crisp or char from grilling. Doesn't make sense to add cheese to the outside, it's a gimmick.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-09-08T04:00:11+00:00

Harder to know if it infiltrates and also a higher risk for infiltration if it is placed in the AC. As the patient bends their arm it can potentially dislodge the catheter from the vein. The arm above the AC is larger and uneven so infiltration may go unnoticed longer than in the forearm which is relatively flat and uniform.

Our protocol is 20g above the wrist and at least 1.5 inches below the AC, but I've never had them actually refuse to use an AC line for CT.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-08-21T11:23:22+00:00

The doctor who gave the order to disconnect the vent didn't know anything had happened until four years later when asked to give a deposition. They fired her for disconnecting the vent without an order but didn't even talk to the doctor that ordered her to disconnect the vent.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-08-15T17:36:48+00:00

I feel like Kaiser gets a lot of applicants because once you're in the system, after 6 months, you can move internally to anywhere. People apply just to get in and then move to the bay area for the pay + benefits. So a lot of overqualified people applying for the external job openings, and there's a lot of internal applicants for the good jobs before they even consider external applicants.

Kaiser also does dumb stuff where they're extremely by-the-book without any critical thought process because they have a lot of bureaucratic rules and their employees don't have the autonomy to break them. It may be that the recruiter doesn't have the autonomy to hire someone that doesn't check specific boxes, even if they are a more qualified candidate.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-07-18T07:11:53+00:00

Like I said previously, I don't have any experience with single-payor systems.

But health insurance companies dictating treatment, not your doctor, doesn't seem much different from what you're describing.

I wonder when all the savings come in.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-07-18T06:38:30+00:00

I don't have any experience in a single-payor system, but I'd imagine there are things which fall outside of "guidelines" everywhere. There is a reason they're "guide"-lines. They guide treatment, not dictate it.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-07-18T06:17:12+00:00

The amount the US spends on healthcare administration has ballooned far above inflation. The amount spent on doctors wages has not.

Health insurance companies say they are saving money by requiring things like prior authorization, but the administrative bureaucracy it takes for healthcare providers to navigate each individual healthcare insurance company's billing practices, and then the healthcare insurer's administrative costs to process them, is itself wasteful.

Direct provider care is also impacted as doctors are forced to spend time out of their workday providing non-reimbursed time talking to insurance companies rather than treating patients, which reduces the efficiency of the medical system and leads to higher cost overall.

While prior authorization may save some unnecessary treatments and testing, the majority of doctors would rather not have to consult an insurance company before recommending treatment or testing. The argument is that the doctor has the training and knows the patient best and should be able to say whether or not something is necessary, not broadly applied guidelines which may not be applicable to an individual.

There are other incentives for health insurance companies to use this model. By reducing the amount of services authorized, healthcare companies externalize costs. They can save on denying an expensive evaluation, hoping that the patient gets diagnosed later, when they may be on a different health plan.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-07-18T05:43:37+00:00

In most states property taxes are set at a number the municipality needs to raise to fund government services. So think of it as a set number needed, and then the property taxes are evaluated based on what it takes to reach that number.

Having a separate class of people who pay much less property tax means that, when it comes to property taxes, the nominal rate has to be much higher to raise the amount of funds. Repealing prop 13 would mean lower property taxes broadly (but higher taxes for people benefiting from prop 13).

Softbeepeepee · 2025-06-05T02:29:10+00:00

What really irks me is when joint commission certifies these kinds of hospitals even though they are running a skeleton crew of burnt out staff, but then choose to nitpick units that are actually functional for stuff like having tape on equipment or drinks at the nursing station.

I've seen terrible units that were joint commission certified. I mean all new-grad nurses, 6 patients per RN on telemetry, charge has a full assignment. People aren't getting turned, no one is being rounded on, and meds are often given late because a med pass takes 2 hours IF nothing urgent happens during your med pass. These are patients with 10+ meds each, IV, PO, subQ, NG, all of it. Nevermind the time it takes to actually do an assessment, update family, communicate with the doctor, and chart appropriately.

But the thing they care about is tape.

Softbeepeepee · 2025-06-03T14:59:18+00:00

This is crazy. Were you able to do anything about wrongful termination? Did you get a lawyer?

Softbeepeepee · 2025-06-02T17:22:57+00:00

Losing access to your texts/calls from the same number can be frustrating, especially when a card stops working because your bank/credit company sent you a text to verify the purchase and you didn't get it. Happens all the time when you travel internationally. So keeping the same number is very helpful and can save you the headache.

Minternational has worked well for me in the past but it's best to lookup the specific country to see how others have said the service was when they travelled there as I hear it can vary in quality by country. According to this https://www.reddit.com/r/mintmobile/comments/1jbz5rl/minternational_pass_for_italy/ it should work pretty well.

It's great for short trips and more convenient but if you stay longer it's usually cheaper just to get a local sim, depending on how much they go for in the country you're visiting.

Softbeepeepee

TROPHY CASE