For the want of a complainer

I’ve been the scheduler for the OR for about five years now. And the OR has decided to blow up the fucking call schedule.

Because, as near as I can tell, three people complained they were getting too many calls on certain days or nights. And my night tech went home at 2130 on two of those evenings and sometimes (often) I needed to call in the evening call tech to cover.

Instead of asking me about it, or seeking my opinion, or doing some basic research and data collection, they decided to throw the baby out with the bathwater and chuck the whole thing.

Instead of 2 calls, one evening 1700-2300 and one night 2300-0700, there will only be 1900-0700 and the two pools of call taking people will be combined.

On paper this looks amazing, less call evenings or nights per week for the complainers.

But there are a few holes that no one is interested in hearing about.

1. I use the evening call a fair amount, at least once or twice a week and now I will have no bridge person in case the schedule requires it because some surgeon is running over late.
2. If I or the evening tech becomes ill or injured and can’t work there is no bridge person to cover from 1700-1900.
3. I am taken out of the call rotation because there will be no one to cover from 1900-2300. This directly impacts my bottom line. Their answer is that people will be dying to give me their call. This is not untrue.
4. If the evening tech is on call from 2300-0700, there is no one on back up from 1900-2300, goes back to point 2.
5. No one likes this change, we’ve lost 2 nurses because of it.

But, sure if it stops the complaining that the two bosses have to deal with, no problem. It just is the problem of all the non complainers who will have to take unfamiliar call shifts and sometimes work until dawn.

No problem, as long as there is less complaining.

Sometimes I feel like Cassandra from the Greek myths who was cursed to only tell the truth but no one ever believed her.