to sleep during my break on the night shift?

[TupperwareTwat]

After 5 years of getting away with working lates, earlies and long days only, I have this week started mandatory rotation on to night shifts.
The NHS trust I work for now requires day shift workers to do a minimum of 4 weeks of nights per year and vice versa for night shift workers.
I began my 12 hour shift at 8pm on Monday. At 2am the Sister asked me if I would like to go for my break (1 hour unpaid). I told her that I would like to go somewhere to sleep and she said that we are not allowed to sleep during our break in case anything happens and we are needed.
I asked her what we are supposed to do on our 'break'. She told me that she takes a book and reads for an hour.
I took a book and a blanket and my coat to the rest room, pushed 4 stand chairs together, led down and rested my eyeballs for an hour. The Sister came knocking on the door after an hour and I got up and staggered back to work while she went for her break. I felt relatively fantastic after my sleep.
When I told DH about this he said I should not have told her I was going to sleep on my break, and that I could get sacked for this.
I don't believe that my employers should even expect me to remain on the premises on my unpaid break!
Or am I being unreasonable?

How about "their loved one hadn't got the right kind of emergency treatment because the nurse/doctor was dead on their feet at 6am, having been prevented from resting earlier in the shift when clinical pressures were lower"?

Cuts both ways. A trust I know of had to change their night shift patterns after three separate incidents in a year where people commuting home after nights fell asleep at the wheel. Is that the kind of alertness and higher function you'd want in someone looking after your family?

I don't work for the NHS, but surely if it is your break you are entitled to do what you like as long as you are back and functioning on time?

The emergency thing sounds a bit odd - do people who work days have to stay in the hosital during their lunch hour or can they pop out to the shops (if there are any nearby); so they would not be there for emergencies either?

Starfish mummy- I've never worked in a hospital where you are allowed off the premises during your shift. Also, during the day, the breaks are never combined to make an hour long break, they are taken in 20 or 30 minute breaks so no time to get changed twice and do anything other than shovel your meal in. And before anyone says they see staff in uniform on the bus or in Tesco, I know, but they can be disciplined for that too!

Out of interest as a nurse do you get paid for the time you spend helping out on an emergency when you are officially on your break?

"OK you can argue that the NHS trust should make sure that there are enough members if staff to cover breaks.effectively but the fact is that on a night shift in most if not all NHS trusts that just isn't the case."

Same old story in the NHS all the time iliketea....they understaff wards yet if something goes wrong the individual nurse is held responsible

So the wards and staff limp along....breaks we don't need them

I normally do a 13 hour long days for which I am paid 11.5 hours. we are expected to take 1.5 hour unpaid break hahahaha!
If we go to the rest room for break we are constantly disturbed and asked to do (non-urgent) things like answer phone calls etc. I do resent this when I am on my unpaid break.
However, I would have absolutely no problem with a genuine emergency and have often stayed later than my finish time in such situations.
I don't leave the premises although some of my colleagues do as they live close by and I don't blame them for it!
Maybe I should take up smoking and join my colleagues outside the hospital premises during my unpaid break? This is allowed during unpaid breaks as far as I am aware!

Do we heck bronze

If We were paid for all the breaks we miss and hours we work over we'd all not need to work

Sorry I know it's an unpaid break but I'm guessing you can't then put in for the time worked

Does anyone ever say no when asked to answer the phone etc (I understand not refusing in an emergency)

No one ever says no when the phone is handed to them. The only way out of it is to be off the premises!

I don't think anyone should be sleeping, you said yourself you staggered back to work. If anything happened and you were needed you wouldn't be alert enough to deal with it.

And how do they prove that someone is asleep if they just happen to be sat there with their eyes shut

It is such a fucking stupid rule. Someone asked earlier how people would feel if their relation didn get appropriate care because a nurse was a asleep on their unpaid break. Well I wouldn't be blaming that nurse. It would be like blaming all the nurses who weren't at work at the time.

I also said that I felt relavely fantastic after my sleep valium and that the Sister commented on how well I had coped on my first night shift compared to my colleagues from the day shift!

I work as a commercial pilot. It has been recognised for years that short monitored rests (even whilst sitting in the cockpit) mean that the pilots are less susceptible to fatigue. By fatigue, we are talking about something beyond 'very tired' and into the realm of 'dead tired. Unable to function.' Fatigue can happen when you are working long nights shifts very easily. We take 'controlled rest' at work, using a method designed by NASA. It is very simple - we tell our colleagues we are on controlled rest, decide a time we want to be woken up, and then shut our eyes and snooze. Often our controlled rest breaks are not much longer than 20 minutes or so. But we plan them to be at a time of low workload so that we are alert and ready at times of high workload.Of course, an emergency can happen while you are resting, but it is considered to be unlikely, and you have colleagues who should be awake to start dealing with it while you rub the sleep from your eyes and figure out what the hell just happened!

I am going to go against the grain of the many posters who are a bit at people sleeping on their break. I would actually be concerned about being treated by someone who was 11 hours into a 12 hour night shift who had not even been allowed a quick rest of their eyes.

OP, google 'NASA controlled rest' and you will get thousands of returns explaining NASA's theory of short naps being good for you wrt alertness at work. If it's good enough for astronauts, I'm sure it's good enough for the NHS!

What do you say to my point at 16:40:34, vr?

Phone answering is another obligation because in a lot of areas it could be an emergency coming in, forewarning of theatre case, a woman in labour needing advice, a request for assistance from another ward. Ignoring the phone just isn't an option

Valium that's the point though isn't it. If they're not being paid then they're not actually being employed at that moment and shouldn't have to go anywhere. If you want to call on someone when they were on their break then you pay them for it.

*relatively
Bloody night shifts fucking with my brain!

Of course Backinthebox has made my point much more fully and eloquently.

Aviation and the nuclear power industry kick healthcare's arse all over town when it comes to crew resource management and personnel factors like this.

YANBU!

I thought every night worker slept or at least dozed on their breaks. Admittedly, when my DH worked nights, it was in I.T. (so not on a par with a health care job), but he and his team used to take turns to sleep a good two or three hours.

I also think it's disgusting they don't pay you for your breaks.

brux Resting yes, sleeping no. I honestly don't think anyone should be sleeping at work in their breaks. A quick shut eye in a chair with a book possibly but a mattress and proper sleep just doesn't sit right somehow. Just because the OP was ok and alert after sleeping doesn't mean that everyone will be.

Yes they SHOULD be paid if they can't leave the building, I agree.

A short sleep would be refreshing and would perk you up I'm sure.

I think if they really wanted you to be on stand by they would pay you. It's unreasonable to expect unpaid work.

But traffic there should always be someone on the ward who can answer the phone without disturbing someone on a break.

to be honest i dont think you are being unreasonable providing you are ready to go back when you need to be.

i work nights in the police, and though i have never done this personally (i would feel worse) we are told that because we are expected to drive, at speed, during the night, that if we feel the need to stop and have a sleep, we can - in theory

the reality is different for me - A) i would not relax enough in case something happened on the radio and i missed it and B) i would in reality feel worse after 1 hour than not sleeping at all.

but i cant see how safety can be maintained if you are dead on your feet tbh, and research has shown that cat naps can help sustain you during a night shift - so if you are able, i would say YANBU.