[Dove1019]

Hello I am new to this website, but I am a new nursing student working on getting information for a research paper I am writing. Since I do not know any nurses myself I have had a hard time communicating with nurses and found this website to be the best I could do so if there is anyone out there willing to give me a couple minutes of your time I would greatly appreciate it!!!

The topic I am working on is registered nurses and their perception of current nursing problems. So my question to you is what is at least one current nursing problem that you would consider siginificant and what are your feelings about this?

Thank you again for your time it is GREATLY appreciated!!!!!

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[TheCommuter]

Although I'm a lowly LVN, I'll still answer your question with the hope that it will help you out. I welcome the RNs to expand on what I have already conjured up.

1. The lack of respect from doctors, patients, family members, coworkers, managers, and society

2. The increase in accountability for patient outcomes, without the corresponding increase in salary

3. The fact that new nurses are churned out into the workforce every 6 months, further saturating the job market for nursing

4. The general consensus that nurses are warm bodies who simply fill shifts

5. The low workplace morale that can often be observed at many healthcare facilities

6. The low self-esteems and passive aggression of some nurses

7. The increase in lateral workplace harassment

8. The public's very outdated perception of the nursing profession

9. The fact that there is a myriad of different ways to become a nurse (LPN, ADN, BSN, MSN, Ph.d)

10. The female domination of the nursing profession

11. The desire for hospital administrators to maximize profit margins, without regard to nursing staff or patient safety

12. The practice of recruiting new nurses, rather than the retention of highly experienced nurses

13. The expectation that nurses can "do it all" while working understaffed, and lacking supplies

14. The lack of integrity of some members of the interdisciplinary team (i.e., the admissions rep who will allow anyone to be admitted if the insurance is good)

15. The expectation that the nurse is also the customer service rep, bellhop, concierge, waitress, clerk, messenger, courier, pillow fluffer, and receptionist

[classicdame]

I don't agree with everything said in the previous post, but I do think we ought to have a minimum education requirement of BSN for all nurses. This statement will cause a furor, but it is my opinion. There is a big difference between training and education.

[marie-francoise]

See this thread:

http://allnurses.com/forums/f8/what-...ng-261868.html

[Larry in Florida]

Originally Posted by classicdame

I don't agree with everything said in the previous post, but I do think we ought to have a minimum education requirement of BSN for all nurses. This statement will cause a furor, but it is my opinion. There is a big difference between training and education.

You don't have a clue!
Larry RN in Florida ASN

[mercymimi]

Originally Posted by Larry in Florida

You don't have a clue!
Larry RN in Florida ASN

I'll say. That comment really torqued me, bad enough to sign up here. I am in school to eventually earn an RN, however if I were to be in a BSN program, I may not be able to finish due to circumstances beyond my control. Then where would I be??
I'm perfectly willing to take the hard classes, AFTER I earn my RN. I have a lot to lose. Do/did the poster that said that have a lot to lose when they earned their BSN??? I have a family, a mortgage, 2 car payments, a part-time job, and 2 kids. Throw a tough class and an illness into that (mess) and guess what, I'm gone.

[jmking]

Originally Posted by classicdame

I don't agree with everything said in the previous post, but I do think we ought to have a minimum education requirement of BSN for all nurses. This statement will cause a furor, but it is my opinion. There is a big difference between training and education.

No comment

[TheCommuter]

Originally Posted by classicdame

I don't agree with everything said in the previous post, but I do think we ought to have a minimum education requirement of BSN for all nurses. This statement will cause a furor, but it is my opinion. There is a big difference between training and education.

70 (seventy) percent of the current nursing workforce in the U.S. is comprised of RNs who are educated at the ADN/ASN level. Unless more BSN programs were to quickly come into existence, your dream of an all-BSN nursing workforce will remain just that: a dream.

Various associations have been advocating the BSN as a minimum educational requirement for nurses throughout the course of the past 40+ years, and the change still has not been made.

[TrudyRN]

To the OP: the above comments about this one topic, what the minimum requirement to be called "RN" should be, reflects what the most basic problem is in Nursing - the lack of unity among nurses.

If nurses were unified the way workers in other fields are, such as the Teamsters, auto workers, and other union workers, we could fight our enemies instead of fighting each other. The enemies are the employers who like to use us up and then discard us.

Another major problem is the insurers. They have a stranglehold on health care, they just want to rake in premiums but never pay for anything. That causes hospitals, nursing homes, etc. to cut staff, such as nurses. Low staffing leads to all the other troubles, which are listed so well by The Commuter up above.

Good luck with your project and with school.

[juicyjake]

I don't think a BSN should be a MUST.
I do think that a BSN nurse should be paid more than someone with an associates or a diploma. Don't you agree?

This could be some of the problem concerning the lack of unity among nurses.
If I went to school for four years, and paid 10 times as much as someone who went to school for 2 years, but we are both getting paid the same; wouldn't that cause some desension amongst each other?

p.s. We have strayed way off topic....

There are soooo many problems with nursing. We are all aware of them. Now what can we do to fix them?! Can anyone give a definite solution to one of the 15 problems posted by the OP?