Assistant Nurse Manager - Heart Failure Intermediate Care Unit - Full Time Nights

Northeast Georgia Health System•Gainesville, GA

5d•Onsite

About The Position

The Woody Stewart Heart Failure Intermediate Care Unit is a 24-bed unit specializing in the care of patients with Left Ventricular Assistive Devices (LVADs), low ejection fraction (EF), and those requiring IV diuretics or cardiac drips. Many patients require continuous CVP monitoring via PA catheters and are closely monitored at the bedside and central nurses’ station. Telemetry monitoring is provided by the Central Monitoring Unit. Key aspects of patient care include early ambulation and strict intake and output monitoring. The unit focuses on assessing, educating, monitoring, and treating patients to help them adjust to life with heart failure. Patients admitted or transferred to this unit include those who are hemodynamically stable with PA catheters or CVP monitoring, acute decompensated heart failure without shock, acute decompensated heart failure on chronic or acute bipap, pre and post cardiac catheterization and intervention patients (including pacemaker and ICD implantations), interventional peripheral and renal angioplasty patients requiring sheath care, hemodynamically stable LVAD patients (including post-implantation surgical patients), patients with venous or arterial sheaths, pre-op open-heart surgical patients, and those receiving treatment for cardiac arrhythmia and hypotension including critical drips. The role also involves pre and post electrophysiology procedure care.

Requirements

Licensed to practice as an RN in Georgia.
Bachelors Degree.
Three (3) years of direct care RN nursing experience in an acute care setting.
Meets all competency requirements defined by unit (i.e., BLS, ACLS, PALS, etc.)
Ability to communicate effectively.
Good written and oral communication skills.
Customer service abilities including effective listening skills and service recovery.
Critical thinking skills, decisive judgment and the ability to work with minimal supervision in a fast-paced clinical environment.
Ability to remain calm during stressful situations.
Skill and ability to instruct, direct and evaluate employees.
Skill in providing professional “specialty” nursing care to patients.
Skill in supervision (e.g. hire, train, assign and review work, motivate, prepare performance evaluations and effectively handle disciplinary actions).
Skill in adapting nursing care to the emotional needs and behavior of patients.
Skill in tailoring communication and performance feedback to the individual employee.
Skill in communicating orally with a variety of people answering questions and explaining information and decisions.
Skill in coordinating patient care services with other departments.
Skill/competency in use of computer software program/systems impacting unit performance/management.
Ability to monitor and evaluate nursing care provided to patients.
Ability to identify, plan and coordinate services within department.
Ability to provide consultation to staff, patients and the public.
Ability to direct the training of professional and nonprofessional personnel.
Ability to provide staffing and scheduling functions, ensuring adherence to labor productivity targets.
Ability to work effectively with a variety of professional and paraprofessional staff.
Ability to give oral and written instruction in exact detail.

Nice To Haves

Professional certification in either a clinical or leadership specialty within two (2) years of hire.
A BSN in nursing or within three (3) years of hire into the position.
Masters Degree (Nursing or other if possessing a BSN) within five (5) years of hire.
Charge Nurse or supervisory experience.
Professional organization membership within three months of hire into the role.

Responsibilities

Facilitates and assists with all levels of nursing care provided to patients within a nursing unit or practice location.
Assists Clinical Nurses with day-to-day problem solving and facilitates communication between care team providers.
Coordinates, elevates, and resolves problems and conflicts as they occur.
Has shift accountability for care delivery, patient flow, matching patient needs with available resources, and elevating patient safety concerns/situations that cannot be resolved during the shift.
Coordinates the activities of nursing staff, accountable for the effective and efficient operation of the unit and staff, ensuring stat orders, treatments, plans of care, and clinical pathways are carried out consistently.
Provides expert patient care and is critical to improving the quality of care provided and ensuring an exceptional patient and family experience.
Has shift responsibility a minimum of 75% of worked hours and administrative accountability the other 25%.
Administrative duties include staffing and scheduling, unit staff selection, retention, and performance management, including coaching and counseling.
Serves as a succession plan for the Director role.
Assists in the advancement of the professional practice environment by communicating the NGHS nursing strategic direction and focusing on activities that support the Nursing Strategic Initiatives.
Provides nursing involvement support for Professional Nursing Governance and the NDNQI quality workgroup, including providing team members for professional participation.
Assists with overall clinical governance and other projects as assigned.
Coordinates activities of patient care team on the unit and actively monitors the quality of care delivered during their shift.
Supports the organization's "customer-centric" service program.
Conducts daily rounds on the unit to identify and address patient/family/physician concerns.
Interfaces with patients and families to ensure that care is consistent with their expectations and the organization's quality and customer service expectations.
Assesses, coaches, and evaluates staff’s level of clinical practice.
Ensures that nurses are current in competency, assessments, licensure, certifications, and other annual training.
Works with the leadership team to coach staff, recommends and designs education and training to meet the clinical needs of the patients/staff served by the unit.
Routinely interacts with physician customers and supports nursing staff in maintaining effective and positive interactions with physicians.
Coordinates communication between unit team members and attending physicians or clinical ancillary staff to ensure appropriateness of care and outcome planning for patients.
Coordinates activities by scheduling work assignments, setting priorities, and directing the work of subordinate employees.
Participates actively in the planning and distribution of patient assignments.
Attends daily bed huddles during shift and facilitates decision-making with respect to patient flow.
Maintains regular ongoing contact/communication with all levels of nursing staff.
Works with the leadership team to identify employee strengths, development needs, skills, interpersonal and personal style and relates those to the business needs and challenges faced by the team.
Actively supports and promotes a professional practice model that encourages staff participation in the development of clinical standards, and is collaborative, collegial and utilizes best practice research.
Ensures compliance with established hospital policies, procedures, objectives, quality controls, and regulatory standards and requirements.
Oversees completion of unit-specific administrative tasks (e.g., PI audits, code cart).
Knowledgeable of organizational policies with respect to work rules and discipline and is responsible for providing progressive discipline to employees when indicated.
Provides direct patient care as needed and is responsible for assessing, planning, and evaluating patients; remains informed about the status of all patients during the shift.
Proactively addresses potential customer service issues.
Engages directly with physicians and staff to ensure adherence to evidence-based practice standards as well as organizational priorities to meet pillar metrics associated with safety-quality, service excellence, employee and physician engagement, and throughput.
Monitors staff performance/competency and provides feedback in a timely manner.
Assesses effectiveness of the staffing plan/assignments taking into consideration the acuity of the patient and the budgeted labor standards.
Conducts/completes environment of care assessment.
Successfully completes mentoring class.
Assists with mentoring of Registered Nurses when other mentor resources have been assigned.
May mentor more as desired.