86 NMT Clinical Attendance
CLINICAL ATTENDANCE
Consistent attendance in the clinical setting is a behavior that the clinical affiliates look for in student technologists. The RISP faculty strongly encourage students to maintain a good attendance record. The presence of the student in clinic adds to the “professional preparation” of the student. Although it is possible for a student to achieve minimal technical competence early in certain rotations, the RISP faculty believes that the student will gain considerably from multiple repetitions of nuclear medicine studies on the variety of patients who may present themselves during the time that a student spends in a particular clinical course. Additionally, consistent student participation in the clinical environment helps the student learn interpersonal communication skills and the teamwork that are necessary in the clinical work environment.
It is the expectation of the RISP faculty that students attend all clinical assignments. Awards are presented to students with perfect attendance in clinical experience courses (using no personal days within the course and receiving no grade deductions for tardiness, or electronic clock-in/out violations). All special or lengthy absences from clinic must be prearranged with the program director. All other absences must be accounted for satisfactorily with the RISP clinical instructor. Absences from clinic to study for examinations are strongly discouraged. Trends in clinical attendance of individual students are monitored throughout the program using a running attendance record log.
- Note: A student should not come to clinic when they have a fever, are contagious, are taking narcotics, physically impaired, or are too ill to work for ANY reason.
- Note: Students returning to clinic after being under a physician’s care for extreme illness, hospitalization, and/or surgery will only be allowed back in clinic if they provide a “Release to full duty” letter from the physician. This letter must be presented to or electronically sent to the Program Director prior to the expected return date.
Clinical Hours
Clinical course hours for weekday assignments are generally 7:00 am-3:30 pm, but vary by hospital and by area rotation. Clinical assignments in some areas may begin as early as 6:30 am or end as late as 4:30 pm. A full clinic day is 7 hours, not including lunch. A half clinic day is 3.5 hours. A 60 minute lunch break is assigned at each hospital to coincide with the flow of patients. Changes can be expected depending upon the area of rotation, certain classes, and the demands of faculty also practicing in a busy medical facility. Within reason, entering the health professions must be accompanied by an understanding that strict time restraints cannot be applied to clinical problems. Involvement with critical medical problems demands continued presence of the professional staff no matter what a time clock says. Start and release times may change slightly during the length of the program. Students will be notified of changes as they come about. It is the student’s responsibility to know and abide by the set clinic hours for their assigned site rotation (see Clinical Site List with Start/Release Time Chart posted in Canvas).
Recording Clinical Attendance
Students are required to use the E*Value Time Tracking system to document their attendance in clinic. Students must clock in through E*Value on a hospital computer upon arrival and clock out on a hospital computer when leaving clinic. It is the student’s responsibility to maintain a record of clinical attendance in the E*Value Time Tracking system and to enter the information accurately daily.
- There is no grace period for a late clock in (1 minute late is tardy)
- If a student forgets to electronically clock-in or out (missed punch), the student must contact the NMT/RISP clinical instructor immediately via email. The NMT/RISP clinical instructor will verify all student missed punches with the clinical site supervisor. If it cannot be verified that the student was present in clinic, the student will be charged with a No-Call / No-Show.**
- If a computer is not available for clocking in when the student arrives, they are to clock in as soon as possible and enter a note in E*Value explaining why they clocked in late and the time they arrived. The site clinical supervisor will verify that the information is correct when they approve clinical times. The E*Value note is also available to the RISP clinical instructor.
- Students should not leave clinic before 3:00 pm w/o NMT/RISP clinical instructor permission. Permission is assumed granted to leave early when the department is closing, however Notes indicating department closure must be entered into EVlaue.
- Students are not allowed to work through lunch and clock out early
- Students are not allowed to clock out early if there are no exams to be done. When the department is slow, students should practice and become more familiar with the equipment, protocols, and quality control tasks. Students can study with permission from the clinic site technologist. However, students should not expect to have time to study or work in Canvas during clinical hours.
- The clinical site supervisor will verify all times entered by the student and the NMT/RISP clinical instructor will verify all P-days and any unusual attendance/database activity.
- Students must always put a comment in the E*Value note field if there is unusual attendance/database activity
- Students may not clock in and out for anyone else
- Students may not arrive late or leave early from program clinic rotations or classes because of their personal work schedules. See Part Time Employment section for further information.
**Procedures for entering clinical time into E*Value are provided in the Clinical Canvas site and on the E*Value Home page.
**For clinical penalties due to attendance and attendance recording issues, see Violation of Clinical Policies section.
Tardiness Policy
Students are expected to be in the assigned clinical area on time. A tardy is defined as one (1) to fifteen (15) minutes late. Tardiness/lateness problems will not be tolerated. Please note: continual car trouble, traffic problems, oversleeping, etc. are not acceptable reasons for lateness. Tardies over fifteen (15) minutes will be converted to a ½ p-day. (If converted to a ½ p-day, the student is still charged with a tardy.) A student who is more than 60 minutes late (without notifying the clinical site/supervisor AND the RISP clinical instructor), will be charged with a No Call/No Show.** (see Violation of Clinical Policies section)
Rules for Early Release
Students are not to ask technologists if they may leave early or appear impatient to do so (i.e., preparing to leave). The site clinical supervisor (or designate in their absence) may allow students to leave their clinical assignments early ONLY if the department is closing (lights out, all technologists leaving, doors locked).
- If the student is released early because the department is closing, the released student may clock out, and must enter a note in E*Value indicating that the department is closing and which technologist released them from clinic early.
- If the department is not closing and the student is released before 3:00 PM, the student must notify the technologist that they are not to leave until 3:00 pm.
- Only in extenuating circumstances should the student be released early (before 3:00 pm) when the department is not closing. If all, equipment is down or some other extenuating circumstance has the student being released before 3:00 pm, the student must notify the RISP clinical instructor and ask permission to leave clinic. If the RISP clinic instructor does not respond to the email request within 10 minutes, the student may clock out and enter a note in E*Value stating the reason for early release and which technologist released them from clinic.
The rationale to have students stay until 3:00 pm in clinic, is that students have clinical activities or class activities (with permission) that they can work on when the daily activities are finished (stock, clean, wipe test and survey, enter competencies in E*Value, research project, case studies, etc.), and they should not miss afternoon add-on exams. Technologists may choose to keep students until the end of their regular rotation, regardless of the workload.
- It is the student’s responsibility to know the rules and to remind the technologists that they may not be released early (never before 3:00 PM), unless it is the proper release time for their rotation (i.e.; attendance for a program scheduled class), the department is closing or there is an extenuating circumstance.
- Students may receive an un-excused absence if they leave clinic early (before 3:00 pm or before their rotation release time) when there are still clinical duties to be completed. (even if released by the technologist)
- Students may receive an un-excused absence if they leave the clinic early without approval and proper notification (failure to notify RISP clinical instructor via email; failure to get approval from the site clinical supervisor, or their designate; failure to enter a note in E*Value).
- Students may also receive probationary action if they are engaged in non-clinical activities, whether given permission or not by the technologist if there are clinical activities to be performed.
*Because technologists may not know all the rules, students may not use a technologist’s permission as an excuse to break the rules that are detailed in this handbook and in the course syllabus.
Lunch Breaks
Students must be granted a lunch break of one hour (even though some clinics only take half hour lunches). Students should take their lunch at a reasonable time in the middle of the day. However, lunch breaks are determined by the supervising technologist or NMT Program Director (not the student), based on workload demands. On full day rotations students should receive lunch breaks starting no later than 1:00 PM (or no later than 6 hours into their shift). Students are not to simply leave for lunch, at a time convenient to them, or they could receive an un-excused absence.
Clinical supervisors should release students at the proper time at the end of clinic day. If a student elects to work through lunch or stay over at the end of the day to help when things are busy, that is commendable, but it can’t be used as compensatory time at some future date or to leave clinic early because they skipped lunch. Even if a technologist asks for the help in an emergency, extra compensatory time will not be given. However, the technologist may write a note to the NMT Program Director indicating the extra effort extended by the student so that it can be placed in their file. Such extra effort may also be recognized at evaluation time. This kind of emergency should be very rare since students are not to be used as employees to work overtime when things are busy and should never cause the student to be in excess of 40 hours per week. Regardless of when they start, students should not be released before 3:00 PM.
After Hours / On Call Opportunity Procedures
When there are emergency procedures to be undertaken in any of the medical center hospitals, a student may be available to participate voluntarily by asking the technologist(s) on call to contact them when an emergency arises. To participate in this opportunity, the student must notify the RISP clinical instructor and appropriately clock in and out of E*Value. Each student is strongly encouraged to participate in at least one after hours “call” experience. It is hoped that this extremely minimal experience with emergency circumstances will at least acquaint the student with this important aspect of medical care. The student must realize that while such “after hours” responsibilities have been reduced to a critical minimum during their training, they must expect to be subject to such responsibilities after their training when they will join the overall team rendering medical care.