Retirement in the nursing field.

[A.B.123]

There is an issue going on at health care facilities about nurses who are still working as nurses well into their 60's and 70's. Assuming everyone ages differently, consider the effects of aging (such as decrease in vision, hearing, unsteady gait, ect.) do you think they put their patients and themselves at risk for injury? If so do you think there should be a mandatory retirement age for nurses?

[netglow, ASN, RN]

OP, your instructors are members of allnurses, and they will always deny it if you ask them. Look how long this thread is??? I think you are gonna get found out.

[M/B-RN]

If the OP was tryin to discuss the topic he or she would have commented by now. It is homework, I also agree that the way it is worded doesn't not sound natural. It was written by a professor.

[whitecat5000]

So....you believe that the nurse not going on the computer and seeing an alert caused the patient to get sepsis?

That just isn't the case. Not seeing a form did not cause that patients sepsis. I agree that age doesn't assure competence...nor does years in the profession guarantee competence.

If hospitals had real pension plans you might find more nurses willing to retire. With the bad economy they can't retire. I have 34 years in the profession. I have been a nurse since I was 18 years old. I am computer literate and have extensive experience. If you are not in my age bracket it is easy to say make them retire......but there are many nurses like me who maybe over 50 but have teenagers.

Agesim exists in nursing already it just isn't talked about.

I'm not saying that the nurse caused sepsis. I'm saying the nurse didn't see the alert and transfer the patient to the appropriate level of care as she should of, and as it should have happened.

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

There is an issue going on at health care facilities about nurses who are still working as nurses well into their 60's and 70's. Assuming everyone ages differently, consider the effects of aging (such as decrease in vision, hearing, unsteady gait, ect.) do you think they put their patients and themselves at risk for injury? If so do you think there should be a mandatory retirement age for nurses?

Where do you see this "issue"? When I worked in the hospital, out of a staff of about 50 we had TWO- count 'em, TWO, nurses who were over the age of 50. They were both incredible nurses... maybe slower on the computer than the rest of us and one of them would get more bent out of shape than the younger nurses when they made changes to the computer charting system, but one's ability to quickly use the computer does not affect one's ability to assess a patient.

Now, I am 28 about to be 29 years old on Friday and I have many of the issues you address here... my visual acuity is good but I am 25% peripherally blind secondary to temporal lobe surgery at the age of 19... my left side is weaker than my right which becomes noticeable after stress/exertion so when that's the case, my gait isn't as steady as it normally is. I, however, do my job just fine as these are chronic problems that I deal with every.single.day.

The decrease in vision that comes with age is generally something that requires reading glasses. Young people can be far-sighted as well... should anyone who needs glasses not be allowed to enter the nursing profession? Same with hearing problems... there are any number of reasons why someone could have hearing loss... should someone who had cancer as a child and received ototoxic drugs not be allowed to work as a nurse because of their hearing deficit?

A blanket age for retirement is foolish is any profession. The Chief of Neurosurgery at my former hospital is easily in his early 70s... he recently stepped down from being Department Head but continues to operate. I would trust him to operate on me any day. My own neuro-ophthalmologist is 79! It takes him a long time to type a note and he types with 2 fingers but I've yet to see how that affects his ability to test my vision.

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

I'm not saying that the nurse caused sepsis. I'm saying the nurse didn't see the alert and transfer the patient to the appropriate level of care as she should of, and as it should have happened.

If we need computer alerts to tell us that a patient is going South, we've got much bigger problems in nursing than senior staff members.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

I think the mandatory retirement age for nurses should be 50 since that is the age I am currently.

And their retirement pension should be funded by the the young nurses just starting out.

Get it done ASAP please OP.

I need reading glasses already. Makes me a danger to patients. Let's drop that age to 38 to protect the patients from my aging eyes.

I'm not saying that the nurse caused sepsis. I'm saying the nurse didn't see the alert and transfer the patient to the appropriate level of care as she should of, and as it should have happened.

Said before I could:

If we need computer alerts to tell us that a patient is going South, we've got much bigger problems in nursing than senior staff members.

[HouTx, BSN, MSN, EdD]

Whoa! What a kerfluffle (just love that word & I don't get to use it often)

Full disclosure: I am ancient - still tottering around on my own steam with all my original parts intact & sensory deficits corrected by reading glasses.

[Rant begin] I take extreme exception to the common myth that we (elders) are not as proficient with high tech/computers. I taught myself programming in the early 80's. I have been developing automated educational programs since there was something available to 'automate' them... now I create online education using a variety of software. I work with colleagues of various ages to analyze and improve user interfaces for electronic records. Many of these folks are well past 50 - and 60.

Nurses are extremely quick learners & you can't be an effective clinician unless you have a superior level of manual dexterity - so what in the world makes you think that older nurses are less capable with computer interfaces???

[Rant end]

[Overland1, RN]

Age and experience have little to do with each other in the larger realm of quality of care. There are a few older nurses who are stuck in a rut, and there are newer nurses who have learned the latest and greatest stuff (which many older ones sometimes refuse to learn). I often look at new and capable nurses as those who have not acquired any bad habits.

Some years ago, I learned that the largest accounting firms would rarely hire from another firm, but rather preferred to hire from "right out of college". In that way, they could train people in their way of doing things, retaining those people as they rose through the ranks (i.e., partner, senior partner, etc.). Maybe we, in the Nursing profession, should follow this example and bring in the new people who will eventually replace (and likely provide care for) us in the coming years.

[Altra, BSN, RN]

As this is the OP's only post here at AN, I'm not going to get my feathers too ruffled.

Everyone, particularly students not yet in the professional workplace, would do well to remember that adult careers span roughly age 20 - 70, give or take a few years. Social Security full retirement age is 67 for everyone born in 1938 or later. Virtually all workplaces will include folks at either end of the age spectrum and a bunch of folks in the middle. If you can't deal with that ... then make sure you get training in a field that will allow you to work from home solo.

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

I'm not saying that the nurse caused sepsis. I'm saying the nurse didn't see the alert and transfer the patient to the appropriate level of care as she should of, and as it should have happened.

I am truly not trying to be obtuse.....but how does the computer know the patient is septic....what alert "form" did it have that the computer woud have diagnosed the patient with sepsis?

The point I am trying to make is the maybe this nurse doesn't have great skills and the computer had nothing to do with it. "We" (the collective we) have "diagnosed" or recognized sepsis without computers for years with knowledge, experience and well tuned assessment skills. I have recognized sepsis thousands of time over without a computer and even when the computer lab work doesn't reflect the patients condition.

Not "knowing" the computer had notghing to do with this nurses failure to recognize and treat this patient.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

The OP hasn't participated in the thread -- evidently wasn't all that interested in discussing the assumptions that he/she threw out.

Computer skills or the lack thereof have very little to do with the ability to assess patients or recognize problems. Those of us who are old and feeble have learned to work smarter . . . whether or not our computer skills surpass everyone else's. Most of us have learned to cope with the computer -- we have to use them to chart, pull up labs, etc. The idea that just because I was born in 1955 I am computer illiterate is in and of itself discriminatory. As is the idea that I'm too old to work.

[nurseprnRN, BSN, RN]

The OP hasn't participated in the thread -- evidently wasn't all that interested in discussing the assumptions that he/she threw out.

Or has harvested all the quotations s/he thinks is necessary to present his/her "research." Feh.

Good ta see ya around again, Rubes. 1955? A mere babe.