What was it like to be a nurse in the 1980s

[fatrabbit]

I'm writing a paper for one of my classes. I have to briefly discuss what the role of the nurse was in the 1970s/80s. The only sources I can find talk about events pertaining to nursing in the 1980s.

I really want to know the experience of being a nurse in the 80s. How much respect did nurses have? Where they able to question doctors? advocate for patients?

[Libby1987]

Oh yes, above poster brings back memories of smoking inside just going out and gloves just coming in.

Can you imagine, smoking and no gloves unless you were cleaning goop and sometimes even then..

[Ladyscrubs]

Gosh, I remember the gloves, or lack thereof. I was an LPN and we were given this ditty to think over…"do you wear gloves to wipe yourself? No, well then why would you wear gloves to wipe your patient, you're giving them the message that that their feces are offensive." Also reminded about facial expressions when swabbing up GI bleeds and Hersey squirts.

I had a latex allergy, and my head nurse complained that I was breaking the floor budget with my need for latex free gloves and she told me to limit my use or wash and reuse them.

1981 brought in our first HIV patient. The entire hall was partitioned off and visqueened and the transporters wore hazmat suites. CPR training got simpler—we just had to pretend to give breathes.

[amoLucia]

... Full lunch breaks in the hospital.

Hey! We could actually leave the facility and go across the street to the deli and stay to eat there!

Half hour but we still could!

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

I was a nurse in the 1980's. I never changed throughout the decades.

I did my best for my patient... whatever that took. I questioned the doctors ... advocated then and advocate now. It's my JOB.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

If I could remember I'd tell you

** snort** coffee on the monitor

[IVRUS, BSN, RN]

What I believe was the primary difference, is that in the 80's we had TEAM LEADING. Each RN worked side by side with their CNA to take care of their patients. The CNA did all vitals, and prepared the set up for meals, and did all the bathing. The RN did everything else, including helping with q 2 hr turns. I quit hospital nursing in 1990 and went into Home Infusion, but then in 99, went back to the hospital setting working the Baylor plan.. Oh MY how things changed in 9 years. ICU was 3 patients each, and Telemetry was 7-8. NO CNA, no help... The RN did all VS, all meals, All baths, and also all physical care including turns and then passing all meds, and hanging, attending to all Infusions... It was called primary care...and there literally wasn't a day I spent there when I didn't fear for my license. Crazy times.

[JerseyTomatoMDCrab, BSN]

I wasn't alive in the 80s, let alone a nurse, but I have heard lots of stories!

- Gloves? What for? My favorite college professor of all time loved telling us the story of how she stuck a bare finger in a bleeding neck wound while working at a trauma center in Camden, NJ. Anyone familiar with Camden can experience a collective recoil of horror at the mere thought of that now!

- Smoking. Smoking at the nurse's station, smoking with the patients, smoking with the doctors, smoking in the boys room. Anytime, anywhere. Yikes.

- The night supervisor at my first job told me that at HER first job a million years ago she was working an ICU with like, 18 beds and 2 nurses.

- One of the NPs at my last hospital job told us that 20 or 30 years ago, patients that would be admitted to m/s nowadays were considered ICU worthy and patients that went to ICUs today would be dead back then. The care has advanced enough that a diagnosis which would be fatal back in the day is treatable now, thus the acuity is much much higher.

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

I was an LPN from 1997-1980 while completing my AAS program. I worked in a locked psych inpatient unit. Patients and staff smoked in the lounge and in the nurses station, respectively. Visiting hours were limited to two hours per evening. Eight hour shifts, each charted with a different color ink.

Became an RN in December, 1980. Started working at the highest tech NICU in the country (possibly the world)- a plum job I was very fortunate to get. 28 weeks was the outer limits of survivability. PGE did not exist- so the treatment for many heart defects was to wrap the baby in a blanket for their parents to hold until they passed. (Fun fact: I got to work on the drug trials for PGE- heady stuff!) The very first IV I ever started n a human being was a #23 butterfly on an 800 gm. 28 weeker. There were no angiocaths that small. Imagine how often those steel needle IVs lasted on babies. Oh, and the IV pumps were kangaroo pumps.

At no time did nurses wear gloves for any type of cleaning or procedure unless it was sterile. That's right, we started IVs, cleaned poop, gave baths, etc bare-handed. Until late 1981 when we had a baby mysteriously die of overwhelming infection after a transfusion. Our first AIDS patient. Suddenly, they couldn't get enough gloves to supply our need.

Here's what's different between then and now: Exponentially increased documentation requirements. Patient satisfaction trumps common sense and honesty. Virtually every hospitalized patient today would have been in a critical care bed back in the 80s. Except OB. Childbirth has become a spa experience. But the biggest difference? The Quality and Safety Police have made individualized care a thing of the past.

[Farawyn]

I wasn't a nurse until the 90s. My mom was a nurse from the 60s onward- she never wore gloves and smoked, yadda yadda. She had a cap and a cape.

IVs were in glass bottles.

I love these threads.

[SubSippi]

I've heard stories about there being orders for a glass of wine at bedtime (to help with sleep).

[JerseyTomatoMDCrab, BSN]

I've heard stories about there being orders for a glass of wine at bedtime (to help with sleep).

I worked on a unit that also did overnight epilepsy monitoring. The docs would write ANY order that would induce a seizure so they could track their brain activity. Several times, we had an order to allow pt to consume wine from home to induce seizure activity.

[bell1962]

Exactly! I remember most of this. We also had patients that smoked in their rooms. 8 hr shifts for the most part. Primary care nursing , full care of your 4-5 patients usually. Paper charts in metal binders and Kardex's, flow sheets at the bedside. We were supposed to offer our seats to MD's,but that didn't always happen. Patients were supposed to be offered back rubs with lotion in the evening. There were a lot nmore things but I can't think right now.

Not much different in the ICU environment. We worked all sorts of shifts, including 'regularly scheduled' 16 hours. Less tech, but relationships with physicians was the same as it is now. We were coping with the onset of HIV - the early days were pretty scary. Manual calculation of IV drips & all bags were time taped; pumps only on 'special' drugs. Buretrols were the norm. We mixed all our own IV meds from a plentiful stock the unit. Gloves were not the norm unless things got really messy.

Trauma patients were hospitalized 'forever'--- skeletal traction & body casts in the days prior to external fixation devices. There's nothing scarier than dealing with a CircoElectric bed for a new quadriplegic.

Really memorable?? Hospital employees' healthcare insurance was FREE- FREE care for employees & their immediate family members in the hospital clinics. Nursing & staff lounges were very smoky - in some departments, just sitting in report could trigger respiratory problems. No 'core measures' & a ton less mandatory documentation. 'Charts' were big paper trifolds.. each shift used a different color of ink to help differentiate.

Those were the days my friends . . . . .