I'm just enjoying the slow season

Last year at this time we had such a low census that we ended up closing one of the floors. It got so bad that the administration almost went into a panic.

This year the same thing has happened. Our census is low, and the admins are in a panic. They are even talking about laying people off.

"Oh, we might never get busy again," I hear at the meetings.

It happens every year. They say the same thing. They get scared, and they try to make us scared. And then, lo and behold, as the winter months come upon us, the business comes.

And then we are busy until the end of the summer vacation season.

So, I refuse to buy into the panic.

Actually, being the lone RT who works nights, I have never been called off. And, considering no one wants to work nights, I don't have to worry.

The RT department is almost exempt from the lay off fears because there are only 10 of us. Still, on occasion, when the census is down to 4-5 patients on treatments, one of the day RTs has to take a day off and use up his vacation pay.

Of course if the census is really low and no RT wants to lose all his time, we sometimes do 8 hour shifts instead of 12.

Still, the day shifters hate working after 9 p.m., so I usually only miss out on the first 2 hours of my shift if anything. And that's fine by me, because then I get to stay home long enough to tuck in my kids.

So, right now we are stuck in the Q#@^t time of the year. Note, I did not say the Q-word. I certainly don't want to jinx myself.

I certainly don't mind the low census because on nights I can do this. But the day RTs don't get to play on the Internet (ha ha).

We do have our rushes. I mean, after all, this is a hospital and people do have mishaps, and people still do code, and people still do have cp and the occasional SOB episode.

But we simply aren't getting a lot of these people admitted right now. Which, if you think of it, is good for them, good for me, and bad for the admins -- hence the boo-hooing.

And the admins hate the low census. Boo hoo, we aren't making money on all the useless breathing treatments.

I suppose some day I might be an admin and I'll be boo-hooing.

Until them, I'm enjoying it.