Pros
I loved working with trauma patients & making a difference in peoples lives. Also, being fulltime & able to work 3, 12 hour shifts a week.
Cons
I worked nursing at Blake for 10 years, in the first 3 years it was great. After a change of senior management everything went downhill FAST! Staffing is horrible & management promised for years it would get better, but in fact it got worse; alot of employees were either fired or fed up. The nurse/cna to patient ratio is scary & stressful to both patients and staff. They pull nurses & cnas from different units and throw them onto other units. This becames a unsafe environment because different units in a trauma hospital requires special training. Being that Blake is a union company pay is the lowest among all the area hospitals. You also don't get raises for your ability or patient care, you get a raise when the union decides. When I was working at Blake I once waited 3 years for a raise. Also, alot of units have either broken or not enough equipment(for example dinnemaps). It is so sad because when I started at Blake as a new nurse, I had such high hopes for the vision of Blake & the direction for which it was going. When I finally left I felt a huge weight off my shoulders & all of the stress disappeared. Blake lost so many talented & dedicated individuals & with that Blakes rating got lower and lower. Knowing now, if I were a patient I would go to a different hospital & also definitely not recommend any of my friends to start working their.