For charge nurses + house supervisors
Nurse assignment board
+ patient acuity tool.
Most charge nurses still coordinate assignments on a paper charge nurse assignment sheet or a whiteboard, then update it by phone all shift. RN PocketPal’s nursing assignment board puts that sheet on your phone: tag each patient’s acuity factors, see each nurse’s workload, and get a flag when an assignment goes over your ratio or acuity balance.
To share it with the unit, print per-nurse cards with room numbers only, no patient names. The board stays on your device; it doesn’t message staff or sync between phones.
Download now
Live now on the App Store and Google Play.
What the shift actually is
Six things every charge nurse navigates between 0700 and 1900.
The assignment board covers each of them — and just as importantly, it leaves the judgment calls to you.
- 1
Make assignments that hold up after 0300
Tag each patient’s acuity factors and the board totals every nurse’s load. One tap drafts an even spread by patient count and difficulty; you review the draft and change what you need.
- 2
Defend the assignment when it gets challenged
Every reassignment is logged with the time, a reason code, and an optional note. The audit log is built for the meeting after the shift, not for surveillance during it.
- 3
Stay on top of admits and discharges
Mark admissions and pending discharges on each patient. They count toward difficulty, and the board flags a nurse who has too many admissions or an admission and a discharge at once.
- 4
Keep ratios and skill mix in view
Set the ratio for your unit type or override it for the shift. The board flags over-ratio and over-cap loads, new grads with critical patients, and telemetry or chemo patients without the matching certification.
- 5
Hand off cleanly to the next charge
Print per-nurse cards with room numbers only. On Android you can also share or save the same PDF after a screen-lock check.
- 6
Spot equity drift before staff do
An equity dashboard, on your device only, shows each nurse’s load. On iPhone it also looks back across the last five completed shifts.
The tools
Built around the way a real shift evolves.
What we got right
Four things charge nurses asked us to hold the line on.
Charge-nurse experience on our advisors
Our four-RN clinical advisory group includes charge-nurse leadership experience. The board is a planning aid; your unit’s policies decide the assignment.
Patient names stay off the paper
The board is stored on your device and doesn’t sync between phones. Patient initials stay on the device; printed cards and exports carry room numbers only.
Built for the 30-second window
Charge nurses get 30 seconds between interruptions. Reassign by tapping a room and picking a nurse, or set one factor across many rooms at once.
It does not replace your judgment
The difficulty score is a planning aid, not a decision. Flags warn but never block a save. You stay accountable for the assignment; the tool just makes the math visible.
Frequently asked
About the charge tools.
How does the acuity score work?
You tag the factors that apply to each patient, such as ventilator, isolation, active drips, total care, an admission, or a pending discharge. Each factor adds a fixed number of points to a 1–10 difficulty score, and the board shows which factors produced it and totals each nurse’s load.
Will it auto-make assignments for me?
It can draft them. Build assignments spreads patients evenly by count and total difficulty, then shows you the plan to apply or change. Nothing is applied until you confirm, and you can reassign any patient afterward.
Does it integrate with the EHR?
No. The board doesn’t connect to the EHR and has no file import. You enter rooms and factors yourself; a bulk room builder and set-factors-by-room keep that quick.
Who can see the equity dashboard?
Only you, on your device. It isn’t sent to management or staff. It works as a self-audit, so you catch your own drift before staff have to point it out.
What happens at handoff to the next charge?
Print per-nurse cards with room numbers only. On Android you can also share or save the same PDF after a screen-lock check. There is no sync between devices, so the oncoming charge nurse starts from the printed cards.
Now available
Try charge tools on your phone.
RN PocketPal is live now on the App Store and Google Play.