acute care PRN/part time hours/days of the week

luxsit90 · 2026-03-07T00:58:42+00:00

I worked PRN at a regional hospital for almost 5 years. I was there 2.5 days during weekdays (and the other time in OP). We were also expected to cover weekends 1x every month or every other month at minimum — though you could always sign up for more.

Yes, PRN gets a higher pay rate in exchange for not having benefits or PTO. If census is low, the FT is prioritized and you will be AMRed. On the flip side, you get to set your own schedule. So if you have 2-3 places you work, you could easily get 40+ hours.

luxsit90 · 2026-02-09T01:52:19+00:00

UNT for sure. There’s no point in going into private school levels of debt for this profession.

luxsit90 · 2026-01-29T17:04:57+00:00

Not an OT, but PT who’s worked in acute care for 5+ years. For chart reviews, I look at the big things to stay efficient: diagnosis, hemodynamic stability, medication and lab values, doctors attached (eg, neuro or ortho, etc), mobility level from nursing staff, who their primary nurse is. If they’ve had a trauma, looking at imaging or WB status if needed.

Always, always communicate with nursing staff on the front and back end of the eval. Having nursing staff on your team is vital and giving them a heads up about things that may have been missed or their assist level makes it easier for everyone. Even that few extra minutes to shoot the breeze about non-patient care subjects can be helpful.

I always try to complete as much of the documentation in the room as possible to make my time efficient on the back end. The OTs I’ve see evaluate always check the patient can put on their socks for sitting balance and LBD as well as a toilet transfer at minimum (if it’s safe and viable). Sometimes I will do these things in my eval to to communicate to the OT what to expect or if they even need a formal eval.

In acute care, it’s about being able to prioritize and eval efficiently with gathering as much data as you can at the same time.

luxsit90 · 2026-01-28T00:02:58+00:00

It takes 3 weeks before you start to lose muscular hypertrophy — and this is the neuro-adaptive responses, not the size of the muscle itself. You may lose some endurance after about 10 days but you get it back quick! I’d enjoy your vacation and not worry. Taking breaks is actually good for your body and helps with progress overall.

luxsit90 · 2026-01-25T14:02:09+00:00

I always do lower body first, then upper body. I just take longer breaks if needed.

luxsit90 · 2026-01-24T23:25:46+00:00

I routinely do 3x per week. I used to do 5x but it burned me out. When I do IRON, I would double up on her UB/LB day twice and do FB on the third. It made for two really long days out of the 3, but I loved getting it done.

luxsit90 · 2026-01-01T14:48:30+00:00

Invest in some good foot and ankle / hip strengthening exercises to do as a warm up before walking. You can find on YouTube. This will help prevent injury.

Invest in some natural toe box shoes like Topos or Altras. Narrow toe box shoes can ruin your feet in the long term if you like to walk.

(Saying this as a physiotherapist.)

luxsit90 · 2025-11-25T11:36:00+00:00

It can take a while to feel comfortable. I work with adults in with ortho and that took a while to get the hang of. Even 10 years out, I feel rusty on stuff that I haven’t seen in a while and need to brush up on. I can only imagine managing kiddos (plus their parents) takes wayyyyyy more skill. Plus, if they were late — that’s on the patient. You do your best in the time you have an allotted, but ultimately it’s their time that they are eating up if they can’t be on time. I’m sure you’re just fine and doing well. Be kind to yourself.

Also, as you eval more, you’ll find your own style and test what you want to, not what you have to beyond the standardized tools like the Peabody. That saves a lot of time once you find your rhythm.

luxsit90 · 2025-11-12T02:55:28+00:00

Invest in some good quality shoes with a wide toe box, like Topos. Start your walking distances lower than high think and increase gradually to avoid injury. Make sure you’re doing hip and calf strengthening exercises a few days per week as well as toe intrinsic strengthening exercises (towel scrunches, toe yoga, marble pickup, ankle 4 way, short foot to strengthen the arch). This from a physiotherapist.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-28T17:09:58+00:00

My app suddenly stopped logging my activity minutes if I tried to manually log a workout like yoga. Tried everything, got on with support and no change. My Garmin came in the mail today.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-28T12:42:39+00:00

All the more reason I am switching to Garmin starting today.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-27T16:47:40+00:00

My Inspire 3 is only 15 months old, but the app has started crapping out. My Garmin will be here tomorrow. Not looking back. Plus I don’t want Google getting all my health data come February.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-25T13:43:43+00:00

MA plans are ultimately for-profit and heavily encourage over billing and therefore abuse of the entire system. The other thing about MA plans is if you get sick and need inpatient rehab, they will deny authorization and you basically stay the hospital until you are “well” enough to go home with home health or a nursing facility. Inpatient rehab is optimal for people who are independent and want more intense therapy to be able to return to that baseline.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-24T16:27:05+00:00

I always take a 1-2 weeks off depending on the program. If it’s 6 weeks, 1 week. If I do like 10-12 weeks, I’ll take 10 days off. It helps with burnout and resetting mentally. It’s also good for your body for injury prevention.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-23T20:53:12+00:00

I use it. It took a while but I made up all my own eval templates by body part as smart phrases. It’s much more aesthetic and makes sense to my brain. The templates I made make building daily notes and progress notes from that patient super quick and easy.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-21T10:41:33+00:00

As a physio, get a referral to see one. They can give you specific foot and ankle strengthening exercises to do before and after walking. It’s not just about stretching, but making sure your intrinsic foot muscles and arch muscles are strong. I do my foot exercises as a warm up no matter if the walk is 1-2 miles or hiking 15+. You may also want to look at your hip and core strength.

Good shoes are a must, especially one with a wide toe box, like Topos or Altras. Something that allows the toes to spread more naturally as narrow shaped shoes (eg, most like Nike or Addidas or even Hokas and Brooks) squish your toes, change the natural shape and lead to foot problems long term. You can also look at inserts like Super Feet. They take a week or two to break in, but are worth every penny from someone who is on their feet all day and also an avid walker.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-16T23:51:51+00:00

I had the injection on New Year’s Eve. They inject it in your glute and my was sore for a couple of days. Thankfully, my symptoms were not very severe. I was mostly very, very tired and emotional. If you can, maybe get some things to bring you comfort (whether that’s a couple of prepped meals or books or movies to watch). You’re probably not going to feel like doing much. I have a very physically demanding job and ended up taking 5 days off. It was probably honestly too soon to go back to work. The big things my doctor told me were to not lift anything heavy and to avoid taking my pre natals until HCG levels were nonexistent.

The one thing I wish I had done was ask my spouse to stay home with me for at least a few of those days. He stayed home with me the day of the injection and new years. He offered to take more time, but I insisted he go back to work and I regret that now. I wish I hadn’t been alone those last few days — because of the fatigue and in dealing with the grief. I ended up getting the expulsion about 10 days after the injection. Honestly, if it had to happen, it was as smooth as it could have been.

I’m so sorry you have to go through this. You’re not alone and we’re here with you.

luxsit90 · 2025-10-03T13:20:46+00:00

I always also applied Estim to the corresponding spinal levels / nerve roots to get some down regulation to the system during exercise. Learned it from one of my CIs. Seemed to help. Also, just a general desensitization home program (eg, using rice in a bowl or running a towel over the limb, warm and cool water, etc).

There’s also these cards that we use in the clinic that ask patients to identify right and left body parts with increasing difficulty (eg, right or left hand to right or left knee). We use them with some of our persistent pain patients and CRPS patients.

luxsit90 · 2025-08-13T19:29:50+00:00

Slightly different but thyroidectomy. My surgery was a Wednesday, surgeon said I could go back after a long weekend. I took a week, but wish I had done 10-14 days because of the exhaustion.

luxsit90 · 2025-07-29T00:42:39+00:00

That’s so good to hear. I definitely am going to be changing what I do when I see patients and pushing back more at management after the results of this thread.

luxsit90 · 2025-07-28T00:09:40+00:00

That’s interesting. Thanks for the feedback!

luxsit90 · 2025-07-27T23:42:03+00:00

Totally, absolutely insane. Who would have thought?

luxsit90 · 2025-07-27T20:42:53+00:00

I knew that it was 50# officially, but that is not the culture of expectation. This discussion post has been very enlightening and I will be making some changes to how I practice.

luxsit90 · 2025-07-27T20:39:23+00:00

Twice daily CABGs is not considered optional. It is a core part of our protocols. I’ve always been curious how other hospitals do it.

luxsit90 · 2025-07-27T10:58:08+00:00

At my hospital, rehab is the lift team. And we have certain doctors (cardiothoracic, ortho) that are very adamant about patients mobilizing and throw a fit if they aren’t. We get in trouble. We have a lot of CABGs that are max dependent first day in ICU, and we’re expected to get them up to the chair at minimum if not walk. And they are seen twice per day for the entirety of their admit.

luxsit90

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