Calling in sick

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flightnurse2MD said:
Had 2 nurse anesthetists call in sick today preventing us from having afternoon cases added on. Is this a thing at a lot of institutions?
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We see a lot more OR staff pull this than anesthetists. My group’s objective is to never be the reason to delay/cancel a case for staffing reasons - that’s a great way to piss off a hospital.

We also employ our anesthetists so if this happened we would have to volun-tell people to stick around, or get a doc to stay and cover solo. If it happened with any frequency at all the entire group would be calling or his or her head.
 
Why would anyone expect a low level employee to kill themselves for their employer? CRNA’s are a valuable commodity and they know it. I never call out CRNA’s I work with on anything (laziness, not being prepared ect.) nothing would change because CRNA’s are highly valued by the AMC that I work for. If you want people not to take sick days then you should compensate them for not taking them at the end of the year. The “use it or lose” it policy when it comes to sick days will inevitably have this result...
 
BLADEMDA said:
I've had 3 sick days in 26 years but some "providers" seem to call in quite often.
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You were also a partner for most of those 26 years... unlike those CRNAs.

I used to work even if sick as a dog, except that my current job offers sick days, and, guess what, other people use them. Good for them! If the employer wants me to have an owner mentality, they can always make me a co-owner.
 
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We almost never have attendings or anesthetists call out, nurses and scrub techs on the other hand...
 
If I worked for an amc or teaching hospital if I was sick I would drop. But in my private practice group knowing that someone would have to work on vacay or post call 1, I better be a patient in the damned hospital.... and yes it happened once.
 
While I do think there is a certain amount of unnecessary chest thumping by physicians about how infrequently they call in sick, I have noticed CRNAs at different places of work with a tendency to get sick on the first 70 degree day of the season or to extend a long weekend. If you’re sick, you’re sick. You are not doing anyone any favors by bringing your febrile a$$ to work spraying germs all over patients and coworkers. It’s a matter of professionalism to stay home when it’s truly appropriate and not take advantage of good will when it’s not appropriate.
 
GravelRider said:
While I do think there is a certain amount of unnecessary chest thumping by physicians about how infrequently they call in sick, I have noticed CRNAs at different places of work with a tendency to get sick on the first 70 degree day of the season or to extend a long weekend. If you’re sick, you’re sick. You are not doing anyone any favors by bringing your febrile a$$ to work spraying germs all over patients and coworkers. It’s a matter of professionalism to stay home when it’s truly appropriate and not take advantage of good will when it’s not appropriate.
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I agree there is an element of chest thumping but at our med sized shop, we don't have much wiggle room for staffing. If I am running the board and can't put a butt in the chair off all the ORs I know that I am gonna get a "love" note from the CEO. Also, working 24 hrs in ob at a place that delivers 400 ish babies a month is equivalent to Dante's 7th circle of hell. I wouldn't ask any doc to stay unless it's an emergency. When our crnas call in they are expected to find their own coverage (switch shifts, make deals, whatever...) it happens once a month ish.
 
I personally don't understand the concept of "sick". Had a cholecystectomy on Friday afternoon after working in the morning, and was back at work on Monday. We occasionally have CRNAs but almost never have MDs out sick.
 
algosdoc said:
I personally don't understand the concept of "sick". Had a cholecystectomy on Friday afternoon after working in the morning, and was back at work on Monday. We occasionally have CRNAs but almost never have MDs out sick.
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No one in your group gets flu? A cold? I don't think having an MD somehow makes you immune to URIs or pneumonia. Do people show up to work in those conditions?
 
algosdoc said:
I personally don't understand the concept of "sick". Had a cholecystectomy on Friday afternoon after working in the morning, and was back at work on Monday. We occasionally have CRNAs but almost never have MDs out sick.
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You probably need to understand the difference between "living to work" and "working to live".
 
jwk said:
You must not have any women of child-bearing age in your group.
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Or any parent with a sick child at home.

These are the parts of social safety net that need to spread in the US (and are already offered by many big corporations, including the government). We don't live to work, we are not slaves, and part of what we call civilization is to offer a balance between work- and play-time.

If a business owner wants to work his butt off, more power to him, but employees should be allowed a number of "sick days", including for unforeseeable things that impact their families in a major way. And any bigger corporation that's not built to work his employees like slaves, and has some slack included by design, could easily afford to do it.
 
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FFP said:
Or any parent with a sick child at home.

These are the parts of social safety net that need to spread in the US (and are already offered by many big corporations, including the government). We don't live to work, we are not slaves, and part of what we call civilization is to offer a balance between work- and play-time.

If a company owner wants to work his butt off, more power to him, but employees should be allowed a number of "sick days", including for unforeseeable things that impact their families in a major way. And any bigger corporation that's not built to work his employees like slaves, and has some slack included by design, could easily afford to do it.
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I’m not an employee. I’m a business owner.
 
Guillemot said:
Companies should allow employees to sell back unused sick days each year. It would reduce incidence of falsely calling out sick if they got $ for not doing so.
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The new trend is unlimited sick leave and vacations, except the latter needs to be approved by the superior. When you leave the company, you dont get any compensation for unused vacations.
 
The only time I called in sick was when my wife was sick and we had 2 kids <3yo at home.
They didn’t say, “Hope she gets better.” They said, “What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?” as if I could leave babies at home to fend for themselves while my wife was basically bed bound. Or get a sitter at 6 in the morning.
 
nolagas said:
The only time I called in sick was when my wife was sick and we had 2 kids <3yo at home.
They didn’t say, “Hope she gets better.” They said, “What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?” as if I could leave babies at home to fend for themselves while my wife was basically bed bound. Or get a sitter at 6 in the morning.
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You should have had multiple backup sitters who can be called anytime, your partners said.
 
I’m sorry, but if you are truly sick...febrile, barfing every 2 minutes, dehydrated from diarrhea...you are putting patients at risk both by continuing to spread diseases and by not being at your best. I would consider you an impaired physician and not all that different from being drunk at work. If you are really sick, it is unprofessional to come to work just to show off how dedicated you are.

Again this is really sick and not scratchy throat URI sick.
 
narcotics999 said:
You should have had multiple backup sitters who can be called anytime, your partners said.
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Yeah I thought I had that but turns out most sitters aren’t awake, dressed, and ready to come over at 5:30 to let me leave at 6. Turns out all my sitters sleep at that hour. Crazy, right?
 
algosdoc said:
I personally don't understand the concept of "sick". Had a cholecystectomy on Friday afternoon after working in the morning, and was back at work on Monday. We occasionally have CRNAs but almost never have MDs out sick.
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You don't understand what sick means? Why is sick even in quotes? If you capable of passing an active infection to a patient, don't you think coming to work is a little irresponsible?
 
I like integrated sick/vacation day policies.

Say if ur standard is 7 weeks paid vacation. Just make it 8.5 weeks. The average w2 American with work benefits takes around 8 sick days a year.

It’s a “good perk” to sell to employees

Some employers will balk at this and say it’s a waste of money. But the overall goal is to encourage people not to make others sick as well by coming to work. Also encourage more productively and keeps people much more honest.

If they are truly sick. Or who knows. They need a mental day off. They know it will come from their integrated sick/vacation days pool.
 
I had to take 3 sick days last year, but they were against my will. It was flu season and I was starting to feel just awful. I went to the lab to be tested just for “peace of mind”. Positive for influenza A. Not allowed to work until I recovered.

Honestly, this was the best scenario as I was definitely contagious and didn’t feel anywhere close to well enough to do anything remotely resembling a good job.

I don’t understand groups that say, “Oh, our doctors don’t get sick.” Everyone gets sick.
 
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Section31 said:
I had to take 3 sick days last year, but they were against my will. It was flu season and I was starting to feel just awful. I went to the lab to be tested just for “peace of mind”. Positive for influenza A. Not allowed to work until I recovered.

Honestly, this was the best scenario as I was definitely contagious and didn’t feel anywhere close to well enough to do anything remotely resembling a good job.

I don’t understand groups that say, “Oh, our doctors don’t get sick.” Everyone gets sick.
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I thought being an MD made you immune, you get those MD antibodies circulating when they hand you the diploma that makes your WBC work like on steroids.
 
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