Attn Clinic/Doctors office nurses!

Specialties Ambulatory

Published

I've seen this topic before but it's come up again at my clinic/urgent care, sorry in advance if you've heard this a million times. Do you call medical assistants nurses at your clinic? Would you care if a pt or the doc called them nurses? How would you handle it?

I'm the only nurse at my job yet all of us, myself and six MAs are referred to as "nurse" by the pts and the doctors. Ugh! I'm so over it! Is it really that big of a deal? Should i just let it go? I live in Cali where the word "nurse" is to only be used for RNs,LVNs and graduate nurses but theses doctors in private practice don't giva a poo about the law.....

I'm confused ... an M.D. cannot call himself/herself a "doctor?"

Specializes in Hyperbaric Medicine and Wound Care.

I'm calling BS. A medical school graduate who has completed residency and has passed the medical boards is a "Doctor", and is entitled to the the respective title of "Doctor", ancient rhetoric not withstanding.

Specializes in Primary Care.
I'm confused ... an M.D. cannot call himself/herself a "doctor?"

Yes, than can. Legally, even. Are they doctors? I assert that it is still up for debate. :rolleyes:

Apologies for hijacking this very important thread...

I'm a new nurse and it is news to me that members of the health care team would be so careless with the use of the title "nurse". I can understand a patient or family making this harmless error, but beyond that, there is no excuse. I'm truly shocked that this happens in the modern day...

Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
I'm calling BS. A medical school graduate who has completed residency and has passed the medical boards is a "Doctor", and is entitled to the the respective title of "Doctor", ancient rhetoric not withstanding.

I think maybe factorviia is gearing up for a campaign to convince people that a DNP should be called "doctor", but an MD should not?

Since medical doctors (MDs) are already spitting nails over NPs with doctorates being called "doctor" due to the patient confusion factor, I say a hearty good luck with that and I'll go stock up on some Blast o' Butter popcorn.

edit to add: it's worth mentioning that the AACN has taken great pains to explain the difference between a DNP and a PhD in Nursing (or any previous advanced degree programs that have lived and died over the years). You refer to the DNP as a "clinical doctorate" and a PhD as an academic, or research-oriented doctorate. If that isn't confusing enough, they feel that today's master's in nursing coursework is equivalent to doctorates in other disciplines, so to use a little shorthand, you could basically just change the name and it would all be good.

Sorry for the highjack, elleveein. Nothing will change until they get their rear-ends singed by a patent who knows and cares about things like that. My first clinic job in 1978 tended to be lax about titles, but that is changing rapidly.

There is now such a confusing array of letters and midlevel providers compared to prior decades, that now it matters. The urgent care center I visit got in huge trouble because a patient accused a PA of representing himself as a doctor. Not how the word-mincers define it, but how the public at large defines it. He may have had a PhD in library science, but that wasn't going to cut it in this dispute.

Specializes in ED/Trauma/Flight Nursing.

I am confused as to why Factorviia is saying physicians don't hold a doctorate.

My husband is an Internal Medicine physician by occupation (and refers to himself as a physician, to distinguish himself from all of the other people who call themselves "doctors.") He is a D.O. not an M.D.

His degree is (and medical school diploma reads): "Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine" Furthermore, he has completed 8 years of schooling, plus a 3 year residency, So how do you figure he has no right to say he is a doctor?

Specializes in nursing education.

This is the type of red herring tangent that always seems to occur in the APN fora. Weird to see it here too...

But, calling MDs and DOs doctors does not mislead the public- those titles imply "medical school," "rigorous training," "residency." Calling medical assistants "nurses" is indeed misleading because that implies nursing school, RN or LPN clinicals, nursing licensure, and answering to the BON, rather than the technical training that MAs receive.

Until there's a lawsuit it probably won't get the top of mind awareness it needs. Continue to address/introduce RN/LVN as nurse and MA as Medical Assistant. My ID goes into a red-bordered plastic cover that says RN. Maybe LVNs could be green, and MAs another color. In any event, it's a continual education process, so unless a formal policy comes out...and yes, it irritates me!

In the clinic I am at right now, we have name tags. There are two RN's, I am the only LPN, and the rest are MA's. Although we do have nurse visits which the MA's also perform. I have never heard the MA's call themselves nurses at this clinic but like others said patients just assume. The MA's do everything us nurses do. When we call patients we say just say hello this is Jane Doe calling with Dr. Black's office not just a general this is the nurse with Dr. Black's office of if there is every any confusion/concern the patient has the name of the staff member they talked to.

My previous job was awful about calling the MA's nurses though, the MA's refered to themselves as nurses. They would do phone triage and actually call patients saying Hi this is the nurse. They even had their occupations on FB listed as nurse. Most of them werent even registered, they just had the schooling. The supervisor called them nurses even. It kinda annoyed me then but mostly because that place was a train wreck anyways.

Specializes in Ambulatory Care/Community Health.

This drives me crazy where I work now...I tried correcting people in the beginning, but realized quickly that it was a losing battle. No one in the office wears their name badge except for me. *shrug* I guess I'm going to have to learn to get over it.

I work in both an acute care hospital and a clinic. At the hospital we have red badges that say RN on them. I also wear the red badge at the clinic to let the patient's know when they see me and I am seeing patients in the clinic that they are being seen by a registered nurse. It's also educating the public about the differences between an MA and RN and the role we have in the clinic setting.

..

flip flops and scrubs .. OMG! Very unprofessional. When MA's wear scrubs, the practice is announcing they have nurses working for them. Patients associate scrubs with nurses. A different dress uniform should be worn and name tags worn and corrections made when talking with patients as well as introductions. MD's also need to STOP calling the MA's nurses ...

Specializes in peds, allergy-asthma, ob/gyn office.

I have worn flip flops and scrubs ONCE a few months ago to my clinic job... I broke my toe while getting dressed for work. Tried to put on my running shoes.... NOPE! No one else to call to come in (that's a whole other thread... sigh). So on the flip flops went. I felt so weird and unprofessional. Luckily it was a fairly light day with our young doc who did not care. First chance I got I found some clogs that I wore the next three weeks.

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