Am I being screwed over at my job?

I work at a hospital. I make $11.50 base pay, more if I work evenings or nights. I have a degree but it is not required for my job. I am going back to school for my master’s soon. My job requires a combination of direct patient care, computer and database work, billing/coding, etc.

I work in an office that has to be staffed 24/7. When I leave that office for anything, I have to carry a pager while I’m working. We used to have 2 people who only wanted to work nights and were hired as such. They both left suddenly. Now my boss has this idea that 3 of us will work alternating shifts, days evening and nights (1 was contracted only for days, 1 was contracted only for weekend nights, so they are exempt). No set schedules, no patterns at all, no “this is normally when I work” business. A day between a night and a day shift to adjust, but you could work a day shift the one day and then night shift the very next day. No normalcy or pattern from week to week. Shifts are scheduled about a month in advance.

I used to work straight nights for a year. I can’t help but feel I am going to get screwed over with this.

Has anyone worked with a schedule like this? I have worked straight nights and I have worked straight days and evenings, but never alternate.

Thank God I plan to go back to school.