Nursing Imposters

classicdame, MSN, EdD · Dec 31, 2013

Everyone in our facility is required to wear a badge and the badge has a hang-down with "RN" in 1 inch letters. Or it will state tech, RT, Dietary, LVN-----. This is a simple way to let the public know with whom they are dealing. Someone who poses as a professional will probably lie about anything and, being delusional already, will probably overextend their ability and hurt someone. Employers who do not take precautions are putting everyone at risk. Plus, like you guys, it just hacks me off.

classicdame, MSN, EdD · Dec 31, 2013

we stopped the color thing because the public still did not know one discipline from another. The badges are more efficient.

elkpark · Dec 31, 2013

I did notice while working in NC employers didn't require us to show our licenses.Most just said they would look it up online,as if that's foolproof.I think its better to present an ACTUAL license,and then the employer would still have to look it up.That's how employers in my home state would do it.You had better have that license the day you fill out the application or come in for an interview.

The trend for a number of years has been away from "physical" (paper/plastic) licenses entirely, because they are much easier to fake than the BON website. NC was one of the leaders in this and hasn't issued physical licenses in years. That's why you don't get asked to show a license when you apply for a job, and, trust me, they do "look it up online." CMS and JCAHO don't even consider a photocopy of a physical license sufficient verification of nursing licenses anymore -- I worked as a hospital surveyor for my state and CMS quite a few years ago and, even then, hospital employee files had to have documentation that they had verified nurses' licenses on the BON website. If they had a copy of the current license in the file, but no documentation from the website, they got cited for not verifying licenses. I've found since then that lots of employers (including my current employer) still ask to see the physical license, and make a copy for their files, just from force of habit -- but, legally, that is now meaningless, and has been for years.

As to your other point, no one is suggesting that, if you are licensed as an RN in one US state and you are visiting friends in another state, you would be out of line to refer to yourself as a nurse or RN. You are licensed in a US state. However, the issue is people who aren't licensed in the US at all. If you don't have a license (somewhere in the US), you're not a nurse as far as the US is concerned. I worked for several years a long time ago with a lovely woman who had been an RN in the UK before coming to the US. She didn't qualify for US licensure (because of their different educational system), and was working as a psych tech (she had been a psychiatric nurse in the UK). Although many of us were aware of her background and she would sometimes mention it in conversation, she never referred to herself as (currently) a "nurse." She would say that she used to be a nurse. "Nurse," RN, and LPN are titles attached to licensure, not a permanent state of being.

ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP · Dec 31, 2013

I'm an aide. I have tried again and again to correct patients when they call me "nurse" but most either forget or don't know the difference. I even had one patient who tried to tell me that RN and BSN are two different things, even though I'm in a BSN program.

smartnurse1982 · Dec 31, 2013

Thr only reason I don't trust Bon websites all on its own is that on the Nj Bon website,it has my license as "deleted" and then the same exact license as active. There are tons if those on the Nj Bon.I have no idea what that is all about. No actions were recorded under our licenses. Still,my address is incorrect after changing it 3 times through the website in the span of

5 years. It has my old address from 2008.Nj Bon website is a mess

llg, PhD, RN · Dec 31, 2013

In the large community hospital where I grew up ... it was discovered in the 1980's that the Director of Nursing did not have a nursing license. She had lied and gotten away with it for a couple of decades!

Really -- I am not kidding. It was a big scandal.

elkpark · Dec 31, 2013

In the small, rural, community hospital where I started my career, it turned out that the hospital's infection control nurse (who always made a big fuss about how important she was, how much she knew, etc., etc.) was practicing without a license. She had been licensed in the past, but hadn't renewed it.

Irish_Mist, BSN, RN · Dec 31, 2013

In the large community hospital where I grew up ... it was discovered in the 1980's that the Director of Nursing did not have a nursing license. She had lied and gotten away with it for a couple of decades!
Really -- I am not kidding. It was a big scandal.

Wow! Did she ever have a license to begin with? Couple of DECADES? Now that is scary.

From my understanding of what I read on the Texas BON site, the woman who worked as a "registered nurse" never had a license to begin with. And she worked for TEN YEARS before she was finally caught. Of course, the Texas BON didn't get THAT specific, what I read led me to believe she never had one.

This scares me that this is even remotely possible. I would be furious if one of my children at the school was under her care. She could have done some damage if in fact she never had a license.

Irish_Mist, BSN, RN · Dec 31, 2013

I even had one patient who tried to tell me that RN and BSN are two different things, even though I'm in a BSN program.

Gotta love it when peoeple talk out of their hineys. People who don't know what they're talking about should just refrain from speaking on certain topics. When I informed a co-worker my desire to be an RN and informed him helping people was my goal, he told me to become a doctor because it is doctors who help people, not nurses. I guess you can't fix stupid! :down:

Was your patient an older person? I work part time as a caregiver in addition to my full time job. I have a client that just INSISTS that nurse practicioners are inferior to PAs and that nurses with ADNs CANNOT perform the same job functions as nurses with a BSN. This is the type of person that correcting her does no good. Just nod your head. I've attempted to explain, but she is the type of person who knows everything and is never, ever wrong. :banghead:

Such is life!

Ruby Vee, BSN · Dec 31, 2013

It's not surprising, I work with one now, but she's very co-vert about it.
So I currently work with an nurse assistant in small research university clinic who comes across as very professional, well spoken, and etc.. She never wears her ID, always keeps her lab coat on and never formally introduces herself as an NA, plus she will walk the patient through what the clinic visit entails and etc as if she is the nurse. She always tries to appear more educated than she is by her manner of speech and vocabulary. Alot of people we work with in other departments don't know her true job title, and alot of patients believe she is either a nurse or doctor and she does not correct people when they call her nurse. The problem is she is very good at her job and has been there for years even when there was no nurse to oversee things, so that's why I believe the facility will not and has not disciplined her, she's doing everything they ask and more, so they don't care if she's misrepresenting herself. According to the only other NA that works there she said that in the past she has even told people she was an LPN but like I said there was no nurse presence because no-one wanted the job so the NA's were running things, everything got done, and no-one got hurt so everyone (RN supervisor, etc... turned a blind eye) Too bad the other NA did not know at the time that she could report her to someone, she was too fearful.
This NA is very crafty though. Now that there are nurses in the clinic she will not do or say anything out of her scope as an NA, but as soon as we all leave (RN turnover is ridiculously high at this place) she will re-vert back to ''passing'' as something she is not. The sad part is she has some of the older scientists/MD's that call her nurse and don't care what her title is as long as she keeps up her excellent work on their research studies. The really sad part is that's only the tip of the iceberg in terms of problems at this facility.

Your NA was wrong to tell people in the past that she was an LPN, but I didn't see anything in your post to indicate that she's still telling people that. Behaving in a professional manner, wearing a lab coat, and deliberately being well-spoken are not in any way, shape or form doing anything wrong. Being good at your job is a GOOD thing. I'm not sure what the problem is.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Dec 31, 2013

One thing I like about my hospital is that they go to great lengths to distinguish the RNs. We wear enormous RN badges, and we have distinguishing uniforms. At my previous hospital when they decided to go to mandatory uniforms, they decided to have a different color for different units, but the CNAs and nurses wore the same. Where I work now, the nurses all wear one color, and the techs a different one. Plus the oversize badges.

And people still won't know who the nurse is!

Ruby Vee, BSN · Dec 31, 2013

How are you able to work in one state if you're not licensed in that state and you're not part of the Compact?

I understood smart nurse's question to be more like "If I'm licensed in Texas and visiting New York, and someone asks me what I do for a living, can I still call myself an RN?" I would say yes to that -- in fact, I often DO call myself an RN when visiting my mother in my home state even though my license in that state has long expired.

As far as the foreign nurses go, I think if they have a nursing license anywhere, they're a nurse. I think that area is a lot more grey than the black and white of "Either you have a license HERE or you don't." Of course they cannot legally WORK as nurses, but if someone were to call them a nurse, I'd be hard put to correct them.