Originally Posted by teeituptom

When did men get so thin skinned and overly sensitive, which decade did this happen in, maybe we can find a cure. I remember growing up no one was this sensitive, and we did see one he generally got stuffed into his locker at school.

Yeah, those were definitely some better times.
Maybe we need to go back to training little boys to "Suck it up and don't act like such a girl" whenever they cry.
Maybe that would cure it.

RN who is male

If the lead off posting is an accurate quoting of the article then I think the author has certainly not made the case for an oppressive discrimination against males in the nursing profession. Males make more than women in nursing and they hold more management jobs. I have felt no discrimination as a male. In fact I have felt just the opposite, nearly every female I have been taught by or worked with has gone out of her way to make me feel welcome.


I have been discriminated against by some patients. To a person they have been elderly and female and few in number. They come from a cohort group that is very unfamiliar with nursing care given by men. Unless I am the only one around they have the right to choose who will give them care. It doesn't bother me.

Joe

Really interesting thread. I'm switching from a long career in Investment Banking, which is dominated by men, to nursing and I never thought about the potential obstacles presented by the "male nurse" issue. It does give me hope when I read the many positive first hand stories that people have of their nursing careers irregardless of whether they are male or female.

Invariably, everyone’s personal experience with discrimination won’t be the same. All I do if I experience discrimination or hostility in the workforce or classroom is address it directly and feel some sympathy for those ignorant enough to harbor those misguided perceptions – because ultimately it’s their issue not mine.

Sam

This isn't the most serious post but IMHO I like working with dudes because they don't get all caught up in woman drma (ie cattiness) this may sound all stereotypical and bad but oh well I swaer its true that the men folk don't seem to get al backbiting, nasty and dont' have as much of a tendency to eat young as women. Just my obsevation, and an obvious generalizatio, so sorry. I wish thier were more guys, maybe their would be less backbiting, behind your back nastiness. Sometimes the girls make it feel like middle school agian. And all that poopoo is why I took woodshop. I would have rather be messed with (not harrassed or assaulted) for being the only girl in the shop (to my face), than deal with girly craoppla in some girly class. I guess I'm just a tomboy like that!

I think times have changed, where men were less dramatic, less nasty, less backbiting. A lot of these young fellas I work with are completely different in their behaviours and actions as opposed to me. When I was young all young men were raised to be men. To be Manly, To not whine and fuss and all that stuff. The John Wayne syndrome I guess.
Now these young guys dont have any role models like that and actors and role models they grew up with tended to be much more whiny and histrionic. And look at all these wimpy guys who live at home with their Parents sponging off them and they are up into their 30s. Shuckins I moved out at 16 and lived on the beach, never thought of moving back.

I have a quick question. Are there men that work as charge nurses? If so what does a charge nurse actually do? Is more experience required? Is that a permanant title or do you switch with other nurses on the floor? Im a first year nursing student and I was told Id would make a good charge nurse. I just dont know what they do differently from the regular nurse. thanks alot---TN MAN

Heyl TnMan

I'm a Tennessee fella myself (now transplanted to salt-water). Men and women work 'charge' equally. Usually this is an experience nurse who works with the 'house supervisor' or 'administrator on duty' (the Nurse who's in charge of the whole hospital) during their shift and over-sees the availability of rooms and nurses. For example: if one of the nurses from your unit needs to float, and the Pts need to be reassigned--who gets to take care of whom. 'Nother example--if a nurse is floated to your unit, charge nurse evaluates their skills/comfort and assigns pts to them. Charge nurse has various reports to make (is your unit going to have enough beds for the scheduled surgeries tomorrow) so they come around and ask 'any of your pts likely to transfer to SNF or be discharged tomorrow? They usually make assignments for the next shift nurses so confusion at change of shift is minimized.

At UT Hosp in Knoxville there was a position called 'Assistant Head Nurse for Nights' which was basically that but was permanent and involved evaluations of other nurses, etc etc. It was a 'higher' position usually given to experienced nurses as a first rung on the ladder to administrative jobs. Usually the Assist-Head-Nrs didn't have Pts assigned.

Hope that answers your question
Good Luck to ya
Papaw John

male nurse discrimination

Apart from the male nursing students being excluded from delivery rooms at the requests of patients in while I was in nursing school, I have never seen male nurses descriminated against. Quite to the contrary. Male nurses are frequently mistaken for physicans in my neck of the woods and are treated deferentially by patients and their families and often by nursing management.

Also, as far as negative behavior goes- that pervades the profession. Many nurses do not know how to handle stress well and are competitive with each other. Some people, frankly, have no business in the profession in the first place. Others are just overwhelmed by very negative working conditions.

Of course when everyone has a BSN the profession will get the respect it deserves. Ha! The very treating of non-BSN nurses as somehow second class is probably the stongest example of lack of respect for nurses.

Male nurse discrimination

Hi gang,

I have been a working RN for over 20 yrs and the only time I ever had any issue with regards to my being male was once in in school when a female MI patient prefered not having a male nurse. In OB/L&D I had no problems in the delivery room, nursery, or the post-partum unit. I even taught a breast feeding and got extra credit for having blown up 2 balloons(with little tips resembling nipples), taping them to my top and wearing a lab coat while carrying a baby doll for show and tell. There were 4 guys in my OB class and we did experience trouble not being to attend an outside breast feeding class, so we improvised and found a male nurse midwife we were able to spend an afternoon with which was very interesting anyway. Once as a student I had female pt. ask me if I was going to be a "male nurse" after graduation, I smiled-looked her in the eye telling her "no, we get a sex change option along with our Diploma" and left her to ponder that. Professionally my experience is all hospital based having done everything from M/S to ER without ever having experience any discrimination myself or hearing of anyone else who did. I have never made more money for having testicles/testosterone, nor ever let myself be taken advantage of because I am male. I am currently an Administrative Nursing Supervisor at a 142 bed acute-care medical center. I help out wherever possible while working and got a chance to feed a brand-new newborn last weekend her first feeding ever, it was a bit awkward(definitely not as easy as it looked, LOL) and have plans to orient on L&D and Mother/Baby units to become more useful to be able to help on those short-staffed hectic days(and can't wait). So keep up the good fight out there guys and remember you do whatever you want as long you are a competent, caring, professional nurse..... flaerman

From the varied replies I can see that discrimination against men in nursing is not universal. I have also seen this to be true in my personal experience. As I have posted many times on this board I experienced ugly things and blatant discrimination at 1 facility. At my current place of work my colleges don't even seem to be able to comprehend why someone would have problems with male nurses.

Still I want to caution people. Although I am glad that you have never experienced discrimination like this I hope that you don't believe that it is not real or that it is not a big problem for people in different parts of the country. Some have flamed or ridiculed the OP for the things he said; I however see a fair amount of accuracy in his statements. That doesn’t mean that I cry myself to sleep over them or that I even think of them on a daily basis. Still a strong bias against male nurses does exist and it does cause harm and even drive men out of nursing.

Also I don't get the stuff people are posting about young men being whiny or feminine. Honestly I see the past ideal of what a man was supposed to be as impossible to live up to, destructive and well, just plain annoying. Guys beating their chest and having huge egos to cover up insecurity....

I guess instead of posting this thread the OP should have just beat the crap out of someone, scratched his nuts and chugged a bear while swaggering off into the sunset.