Think back to a time when you were sick, whether it be when you were little or just last week. Who was the first person who took you back to the doctor’s office or saw you in the hospital? Chances are, it was a nurse. Nursing is a career that calls for the right kind of people. It takes a nurturing, selfless and committed person to become a nurse. One main point we wanted to give to our readers from our weekly blog posts is that nursing is immensely important to all of us as human beings. By bringing to light the myths of nursing, breaking the comparison of doctors and nurses, discussing stereotypes and crushing the negative ones, we hope that you will see how vital the nursing field is to your everyday health care and overall well being.
Myths of nursing come from a variety of different sources, television and media being a couple of them. In one of our blog posts, we discussed the controversy that occurred between the daytime talk show The View, and their thoughts on nurses. To give you an overview, if you haven’t heard of this controversy, Miss. Colorado 2015 gave a monologue speech on being a nurse. She talked about her experience dealing with a patient suffering from Alzheimer's. The View made comments such as “why is she wearing a doctors stethoscope?” which created an uproar from the medical field. Johnson & Johnson even blocked their own ads from being shown whenever The View airs. Another popular example of how media influences nursing stereotypes is in medical dramas. Shows such as “Grey's Anatomy.” suggest false stereotypes, such as nurses not being directly involved in the care of patients. However, this is not the case in real life.
Incidentally, we want to put emphasis on the comparison of nurses to doctors. Some people believe that the burden of care taking is more on the nurses than on doctors. In our blog post on doctors and nurses, we shared a couple of things about how nurses provide direct care for patients. Mainly, nurses come into contact with the patients more than a doctor does. A doctor has lots of patients with whom they make a few big decisions, whilst a nurse has fewer patients with whom they make many smaller decisions and complete tasks for. A quote from Dr. Suzzane Koven states, “ Nurses work set shifts and are assigned specific patients whom the see frequently during that period. Doctors, on the other hand, visit the patient once, maybe twice a day, usually for a few minutes” (Koven). People think of nurses as being an aid to a doctor, when in reality nurses are performing a wide variety of tasks. Nurses must be able to communicate with doctors to make sure that everyone is on the same page with the patient's best interest in mind. Doctors, although highly trained, need nurses for the main care of the patients.
In our post Prompt 1: Nursing Stereotypes, we discuss a few of the common stereotypes about nurses. The most outrageous one is the common misconception that nurses are just a doctor’s assistant, as discussed above. The media has sexualized the nursing profession, and created the stereotype known as the “naughty nurse.” This stereotype discourages potential nurses, encourages disrespect, and in some cases causes sexual harassment. In another one of our posts, we discuss the nursing code of ethics that is in place to prevent the “naughty nurse” from being possible. The media also portrays nursing as a female profession, labeling male nurses as failed medical doctors, and considers them more feminine. This discourages men from pursuing this career, and influences the shortage in nursing. The portrayal of nurses on social media has an impact on the way nurses are viewed in the real world, so it is important that our readers understand that these are just stereotypes.
Additionally, our post on the "nursing shortage" shows the importance of nurses in our society. If there are not enough nurses in our healthcare system, negative consequences can come to both the nurses currently employed in this profession, and the general public. The website Nursing World cites, “Nurses often need to work long hours under stressful conditions, which can result in fatigue, injury and job dissatisfaction. Nurses suffering in these environments are more prone to making mistakes and medical errors. Patient quality can suffer”. A nurse has high demands and needs to be fully committed to helping their patients.
According to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, “53% of physicians and 65% of the public cited the shortage of nurses as a leading cause of medical errors. Overall, 42% of the public and more than a third of US doctors reported that they or their family members have experienced medical errors in the course of receiving medical care”. They also stated that “more nurses at the bedside could save thousands of patient lives each year. Nurse researchers at the University of Pennsylvania determined that patients who have common surgeries in hospitals with high patient-nurse ratios have an up to 31% increased chance of dying”. Given the high costs of replacing burnt-out nurses and fixing their mistakes, having too few nurses may actually cost more money.
Many people fail to recognize the significance of nurses and what they do. They are often described as “those who work next to doctors” or in other words, a secretary to one. To support our claim of ensuring the public that nurses are more than how they are generalized, below is chart providing a few of the variety of specialized occupations available in the field.
Occupation
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Description
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Sources/Links
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Trauma Nurse
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Specialize in working with patients in need of urgent care; where often times the cause of the injury is unknown
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Military Nurse
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Share common responsibilities as registered nurses; however the workplace is a more dangerous environment
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Pediatric Nurse
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Specialize in working with children of ages ranging between birth and adolescence; most responsibilities are acute such as ear infections, asthma, and growth/development issues
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Certified Nurse Midwife
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Found working alongside the obstetrician with pregnant patients; providing prior to and post birth care and advice/statistics
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Without nurses, as evident after reading this post, the way that we heal after breaking an arm or being sick with bronchitis would not be the same. If nurses did not participate in all of these different fields, the world would not exist as it does today. By looking at the statistics that come from the “nursing shortage,” we can see the profound impact nurses have on our ability to heal and get back to living our lives. Also doctors would be lost without nurses, as hospitals need them to function properly. Nurses selfless attitudes ensure that they will always put us, their patients, first. In our blog, we talked about how imperative nurses are and what makes a good nurse. Throughout our posts we continuously mentioned how important nurses are, because they are too often overlooked. Nursing is a challenging and respectable profession. Constant care and attention from a good nurse, male or female, has nothing but positive effects on a patient's outcome. I hope we have broadened your horizons on the profession of nursing.
By Kyra, Samantha, Brooke, & Casey
Works Cited:
Koven, Dr. Suzzane. "In Practice: The Difference between Doctors and Nurses."BostonGlobe.com. Boston Globe Media Partners, 22 Oct. 2012. Web. 15 Nov, 2015.
"Nursing Shortage." American Association of Colleges of Nursing. AACN, 24 April 2014. Web. 28 September 2015.
“Nursing Shortage.” Nursing World. American Nurses Association, n.d. Web. 14. Nov. 2015.
Summers, Sandy. "The Image of Nursing: The Naughty Nurse." Nursing Times. N.p., 20 Oct. 2010. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.
