What kills me..... (VENT)!!!

[shoegalRN]

I'm sorry but this will be a vent. After working 13+ busy shift in the ER, I come home to log on to here and it simply kills me that NON-nurses (including those in nursing school, or taking pre-reqs, or those who have not even graduated from high school yet!) comes on here and think they know what it's like to really be a nurse.

Oh really????

All the "I will never be that kind of nurse" threads, but never spent one HOUR in our Dansko's......

And the kicker? Telling how you will "handle a doctor when calling one", when yet, you have not had to actually deal with a doctor regarding direct PATIENT CARE!

The superior-know-it-all-attitude simply kills me!

All I can say is when SOME of you actually get into a nursing program, get through the nursing program, pass boards, be lucky enough to actually land a RN job, and then start WORKING as a licensed RN, I sure hope you are TEACHABLE! Because I can only imagine how your orientation will go, because it's simply not easy to teach people who already know it all or got all the answers, without really knowing what they don't know! And then we'll get flooded with threads about how nurses eat their young!

[Lucky0220]

1. couldn't you have posted this in the actual thread instead of creating a separate one?

2. a nursing student has an idea of how she wants to conduct his or her practice. is that so bad? i find it refreshing instead of the blank slates who come into the field and are socialized into the some of the negative behaviors/attitudes that impact us all.

3. so someone is idealistic. when in actual practice, he or she will learn and will adjust their worldview accordingly. it happens to all of us. in the meantime, be kind.

sincerely,

experienced nurse of almost 20 years

sharonh....i don't think that the op was referring to all nursing students. i have noticed a few recent posters (check out tyler77) who have responded to some posts with very inflammatory comments. i would like to think that that she is referring to those types. she usually gives posters good, kind advice. by the way, i love reading your comments. i have learned a lot from them. :)

[jmolinaRN]

Wow, vent! Lemme just share...

I had a lunch with my family and when I started telling them about my day, my sister butts in and says "but you're a nurse! you swore an oath of service!" that just ruined the entire lunch. And what did I get when I logged on line? MORE! More of the "you could have", "you should have".

And the next day, I got a supervisor who hasn't been receiving patients for about 6 years who tells me, "it's all time management". There were 21 patients, 2 nurses (me included), no nursing aides, no help at all, and its all a "matter of time management". Later that day, I got a memo asking for an explanation why I wasn't there to attend to a patient and his family when they were asking the nurse to change the patient's diapers (he was a 57 year old stroke patient). and again "its' all time management" CRAPPY BS! :redlight:

[Fribblet]

Wow, vent! Lemme just share...

"but you're a nurse! you swore an oath of service!"

Actually, we don't swear an oath of service. People who have never made decisions as an independent, licensed nurse have no business telling a nurse "You should have" or "You shouldn't have."

I have no problems with nursing students chiming in with "could it have been this way?" Or, "This is what I think I would have done in that situation." They can be teachable moments for those who are still learning.

But the know-it-all attitude from NS and non-nurses is infuriating. I hate reading a sentence that starts with "I'm not a nurse, but I know..."

No, you don't know. You may have an opinion, but you don't know.

[jmolinaRN]

I so agree with you Fribblet. From where I came from though, we do swear an oath, twice in fact.

1st: The capping an pinning moment when students first get to be in the hospital area, a rather theatrical moment which explains why most nurses here still wear caps in white uniform instead of scrubs. In this wonderfully staged but compulsery event, nursing students say the "nightingale pledge"

2nd: After passing the board exams, the new nurses undergo an oath taking ceremony where again, an income generating stage play takes place. I tried to google "nuse oath taking" to get a general picture and I found out we're probably the only country who does it.

Really tragic...

[CareteamRN70]

As one of those "nursing students" who post into "real nurses" messages, here is my

I think a seperate area for Nurses to post is a good idea...have posting and comment privileges given to only those that can show they are currenlty nurses with x amount of years experience. Implementation of such I have no idea how that would work.

Also, I would still want to allow non "real nurses" to still be able to read those comments and topics even if not allowed to reply. I've learned a lot from the post here and I would hate to see the knowledge of hundreds of good, experienced RN's bottled up in some backroom forum area and not shared.

J

"Not an RN...I just play one at school"

[Fribblet]

I so agree with you Fribblet. From where I came from though, we do swear an oath, twice in fact.

1st: The capping an pinning moment when students first get to be in the hospital area, a rather theatrical moment which explains why most nurses here still wear caps in white uniform instead of scrubs. In this wonderfully staged but compulsery event, nursing students say the "nightingale pledge"

2nd: After passing the board exams, the new nurses undergo an oath taking ceremony where again, an income generating stage play takes place. I tried to google "nuse oath taking" to get a general picture and I found out we're probably the only country who does it.

Really tragic...

Interesting. I didn't notice that you weren't from the US. We had a pinning ceremony where I went to school, but I skipped it along with graduation. It wasn't mandatory.

After we pass the boards here, we wait and wait and wait (depending on which state you're in. Some BON move REALLY slow) for our license number. And, that's it. No pomp, no circumstance. It probably would help instill in some nurses the importance of our job if we had to take an oath to officially receive our licenses.

[Fribblet]

As one of those "nursing students" who post into "real nurses" messages, here is my

I think a seperate area for Nurses to post is a good idea...have posting and comment privileges given to only those that can show they are currenlty nurses with x amount of years experience. Implementation of such I have no idea how that would work.

Also, I would still want to allow non "real nurses" to still be able to read those comments and topics even if not allowed to reply. I've learned a lot from the post here and I would hate to see the knowledge of hundreds of good, experienced RN's bottled up in some backroom forum area and not shared.

J

"Not an RN...I just play one at school"

It's a nice idea in theory, but there's no way to "prove" you're a nurse aside from providing your real name and license number, which is easily faked.

Any one can got to a states' BON site, plug in a name and get a person's address and license number.

Very few of us "real" nurses have a problem with non-nurses or NS reading and posting. The trouble only begins when some of them think they know it all; that they know how it is, how it needs to be done, and that we're just wrong.

On the positive side, perhaps some of these know-it-all types get a strong dose of reality that will serve them well when the start nursing. A know-it-all new grad (or experienced) nurse is deadly.

[ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP]

I do NOT pretend to know it all. I came here to learn more about nursing, asking questions about the profession, career advancements, etc. I will NEVER tell an RN how to do her job or how she should conduct herself when I haven't even started my nursing courses yet.

[SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN]

I don't get too exercised about kids, be it in years or newness. It takes awhile to become jaded. I like shiny new nurses and nurse wannabes. When they act like teenaged nurses I nod indulgently and wait for them to learn. Just like the grown-ups did when I was a kid. And a new nurse.

[PatMac10,RN, RN]

I agree with you becasue I can honestly say that I have been one of those people. I did learn that the best way to learn is from experience. So now I am just sitting and waiting. So I am going to try the silent mode when it comes to nurses venting about how to handle a situations. I love reading about you guys situations and how each of you would have handled it differently. I am seriously addicted to this site it has some very good information. I'm gkad I will have you guys with me through NS, so I have that extra help, advice, and encouragement later on down the road.

[eriksoln, BSN, RN]

I used to find the hair on the back of my neck standing up as I read (another in thousands) a post by a GN about how they witnessed this and that and will never be that way. Then they start in with the "God Calling" angle and start to proclaim themselves as being superior in some way because everyone else is in it for the money or burned out.

Mind you, I said "used to find". It doesn't get to me like it used to. You have to take it for what it is. Its someone on the outside looking in saying "In an ideal world, it would be more like this for me." Now, anyone who has spent a single day off orientation and practicing nursing knows the "ideal" never exists. We are working with people, not with case studies out of a book.

Also, one thing I do recall from school is the theory that when facing a pt. with coping mechanisms that are inappropriate, one does not simply remove the coping mechanism and hope for the best. To do so would leave said pt. with no way to cope with stress and more than likely lead to more/worse dysfunctional behaviors as they seek to replace the coping mechanism that is now lost. I think a lot of the, as you call it "holier than though" ranting by inexperienced nurses is a coping mechanism. They find themselves in nursing school (who among us doesn't consider that one of the most challenging times of our lives) and scared, they have doubts about whether they can be a nurse or not, concerns about the job market overwhelm them. The whole "God Calling" and "I will NEVER be like that" attitude is nothing more than a coping mechanism. Let'em have it. Am I really that concerned about what some student who only recently passed A+P1 thinks about my delivery of nursing care? Not really. Many many bigger fish out there that I do need to impress to be worried about that.

[shoegalRN, RN]

Thank you all for the posting in this thread.

I'm sorry if this thread came off as harsh, but I was tried, feet and back killing me, and I had just had a night from hell.

I don't think it's nothing wrong with being "idealistic". But it just kills me when we are told we are "wrong" for handling a certain situation, by those who are not even nurses. I think it was in the Boston Med thread where non-nurses commented on how that ER nurse Amanda should of handled the drunk guy and how when "I become a nurse, I will NEVER speak to a pt that way", blah, blah blah. I usually bypass those posts and keep it moving.

I just do not get the know it all types. I work with a nurse who is new (1 year) who has been brought into the office more than once for thinking she knows it all. And when I say unteachable, that's an understatment.

Nursing is NOT the place if you think you know everything. Once you get into nursing school and actually start working as a nurse, you will start to see things differently.

I normally don't vent about nursing students because I was there once myself. But this morning I was highly irritated.