I know of no nurses that work this schedule, even voluntarily (overtime, swaps).

Nursing in many states is challenged by unsafely high patient:staff ratios, excessive documentation requirements (on extremely slow user interfaces), and the need to vigorously double-check physician's orders (dangerous drug interactions, over-dosages, etc).

I used to work in a hospital laundry (where we were understaffed, of course), and I spent my lunch hour talking with nurses. Many were actually NAs and had to work second shifts at different hospitals to make a living wage. So even if the hospitals are reporting normal shifts, the personnel are actually working up to twice as many hours.

A friend of mine had to become his wife's driver, because after working double shifts across two hospitals, she could barely keep her eyes open.

There you have it: she was working agency at a secondary hospital. That is due to a decision of her agency or herself; it has nothing to do with hospital administration or nursing in general.

Many hospitals are based across multiple locations, so it's not necessarily agency work.

I do. Nurse midwives, and other mid-level providers are often subject to similar hours and work schedules.

Nurses cannot leave until relieved. My mom routinely had 12 hour shifts extended when she worked in NYC.

And at considerably worse pay with no overtime, asumming nursing is the same everywhere.

they are completely different. Where I work in cali nurses are full time working 3 or 4 twelve hour shifts a week. Overtime optional and highly compensated.

medical residents will routinely do back to back 24 hour shifts with no sleep and even the ICU attendings will do a week of every other day 24 hour shifts.

The 16 hour rule only applies to interns. Once you reach second year the rule is 80 hours a week averaged over four weeks. This means that 100 hour weeks still do happen.

I was forced to do 100 hours a week for a company that had a sadistic culture of over work, you never get anything done, under those kind of hours unless you're doing stimulant drugs your brain just shuts down. I wonder how many doctors are also drug addicts just to make this kind of work intensity physically possible even?

I'm surrounded by doctors and I don't know any that abuse drugs, other than alcohol and maybe weed. I believe they are just so busy and so overworked that they are constantly moving around / doing paperwork. The demands of the job keep them going.

You must have never met psychiatrists then; never seen otherpeople take drug usage so lightly.

You don't know any doctors that use drugs, but you do know of some that do weed.

I'm laughing...

Is weed a kind of tea, or is that an energy bar?

He said abuse, not use.

In my experience, you are absolutely correct. I dated a nurse for a while and later married a doctor, and it was completely different. Physician training is absolutely, terrifyingly demanding.

No, we should direct all the hate at lawyers asking for more than 250k for malpractice

Doctor amputates the wrong leg. How much in compensation is that worth in your mind? There should never be an award more than 250k? I disagree. My wife is a psychiatrist that works in patient. She got a transfer from another hospital who was on 32 drugs. That's clear negligence and should be a malpractice suit but no lawyer will take the case. It's not clear cut enogh. In recent years the pendulum has swung in the other direction. There isn't enough access to the court system for patients wronged by the medical community.

So lawyers demanding 250k for malpractice is what's causing malpractice? OK...

Next you're going to be blaming the patients.

Defensive medicine is incredibly expensive and produces worse results, so while I wouldn't blame lawyers solely. there are much better ways of doing things imho. New Zealand's Accident Compensation scheme is one way - far from perfect, but far better.