:nurse:Recently I have been bummed about all the negativity in the nursing profession. I have vented my thought through this site about lateral violence, bad attitudes and the hardship of being a new grad. One evening, several nurse friends and I were griping about those same topics, however among us that evening was a psychologist. She stated that she has listened to us gripe and gripe and wondered if we wanted her scholarly opinion. Since gripping was getting us no where, we said sure. This is a basics of what she said....
"Nursing is a complex and diverse profession, there are nurse in pediatrics and onocology and surgey and home care and so on. There are nurses that are older and new and younger a new, younger and experienced, younger and inexperienced. There nurses that are christians, muslims, buddists and aetheist. There are nurses that are from the U.S. , from India, from England and so on. There are nurses that are LPN, RN ,ADN, BSN, MSN, etc. You are a very diverse group of professionals that are all grouped under the title of nurses. I'm I correct"
"20- 30 years ago was nursing that diverse? Probably not."
"The job of nursing has grown and changed over the years. But the professon has not. Nurses still must do the things that were standard 20 years ago. All those things that were considered paying your dues to the profession before you could be considered a nurse. The early morning classes, the having to work one or more years in acute care before moving into something more suitable, working hours that were potentially harmful to self and patients, the dealing with bad preceptors and nursing instructors, and living with the lateral violence."
" Nursing needs to embrace this diveristy, utililize it to it's fullest extent. Use the strong personal attributes of the diverse group of people to the fullest extent, instead of pigeon holeing them into the way things have always been done. Done that way for no reason other than that is the way it has always been done. Prehaps if that new grad is 'not getting it' on a the med/surg floor, she isn't suppose to. He/she is prehaps more suited to working in home care or surgery. Each area of nursing has it's own attritubes that work in that setting. Use the personal attributes to allow each nurse to be the best nurse that he/ she can be.
I had to sit back and think about that. Alison was right. Not everyone is going to be a great floor nurse or a great surgical nurse. That is one the greatest things about nursing. I have met surgical nurse who be horrid as pediatric nurses and peds nurses who just don't get geriatrics. There are nurses who couldn't write a scholarly article to save their jibs but are the most wonderful at adminstration. Each of us comes with our good and bad attributes. Utilize those attributes.
Those of us nurses, said 'you just can't change the old ways because you want to" Alison answered back with. "You all believe in evidence based practice. Then find the evidence. Do research. If the changes still don't come, then can you truly can't say your practice is not based on evidence. For example, You all complain about lateral violence. First of all that is also part of the human existance. It is the way females are taught and expected to act. I know many of you don't act that way, but it is inherent in the way females and those with female patterns act. Secondly, If you believe that lateral violence is a detriment, then prove it. Find those good at research and find how what effect lateral violence has on the work place, the burn-out rate of nurses, the drop out rate of new nurses, the effects on patients and patient's families. If there is a positive correlation between lateral violence and negative outcome, find away to change it. Use all the great education you have received. You know what they say, 'cure the symptoms and the problem still exists, cure the problem and it goes away'.
I find those to be great words of wisdom. Utilize the individual attributes of nurses to the fullest extent for both ourselves as nurses and as people. Do just settle for it because it has always been done that way. Take charge of our profession and make it a profession that we can all enjoy, excel at, and be proud of.
I love all of your comments! Yes I have read them all:idea: and wish a could comment back to all individually but I would be up all night. I wrote what I wrote because I was bummed. I worked a long time to find a career that suited who I was inside. I found that I am nurse, but was bummed by all the negativity. I understand that negativity is all careers, bu most of my life I have been surrounded by police, firefighters and military people. These people are see their profession as "a brotherhood" They pull together and stand together. Yes there is infighting at times but when the hard times come they stand together. Warped prespective maybe, but that is what I thought nursing was like.
Up until that conversation and a must say a glass of wine or two, I was ready to quite. I had spend many years getting the best education I could and fighting the establishment to get into school and convince people that nursing was the right thing for me to do at a 45+ person.
Alison put things into prespective and gave some insights into things I had not considered. She gave a postive outlook. She wanted us to step back out of the day to day negativity and look at the prespective. You must understand there were 6 nurses and one of her.
Alison made me think. She helped changed all the negative in something more positive. She has made some of you out there think about nursing. Alison has read all of your comments and she is quite amused:lol2: and enthused about all of this. She never thought that her simple idea could cause such discussion. Don't take it the wrong way after all she is a psychologist and is standing behind me as a write this. She was trying to help. Ailson's personal specialty is helping people find happiness in life and suggested reading "Happiness Now" by Robert Holden, PhD. She says it is very enlighting.
If my writing has sparked a thought, great, it raised me from being bummed to being able to get out of bed for work one more day. Change does not happen overnight, but if the food for thought is place, then change might just happen. Changes in the nursing profession might not happen in the next year or the next five years. Change is possible. Change can start with one person (if change is what we truly want). Take a look back into history, civil unrest and all the rest. You could be the one that starts the change.
I wanted to post something positive about nursing and that is what I did. Thanks for all of your comments and I look forward to reading anything more you all have to say.
Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
I'm glad Alison was able to lift your spirits about choosing nursing as a career, especially as an older student, whitedoginwi. To be really honest with you, most of what I hear described now-a-days as the norm in nursing sounds like an alternate universe to me. The term "lateral violence" was completely unknown. I don't know when it became so commonly used, since I left to raise kids and returned 5 yrs. ago. The older nurses could be gruff or abrupt, but I never felt they wanted me to fail. My "buddy" (didn't use the term preceptor either) after orientation was patient and very helpful. When I left my first hospital job my Nurse Manager told me she really hoped I would come back. She was a gem. I guess I never really appreciated all that until now, hearing all these horror stories. So, thank you M, B, MB, and Y, where-ever you are. :redpinkhe
whitedoginwi
32 Posts
I love all of your comments! Yes I have read them all:idea: and wish a could comment back to all individually but I would be up all night. I wrote what I wrote because I was bummed. I worked a long time to find a career that suited who I was inside. I found that I am nurse, but was bummed by all the negativity. I understand that negativity is all careers, bu most of my life I have been surrounded by police, firefighters and military people. These people are see their profession as "a brotherhood" They pull together and stand together. Yes there is infighting at times but when the hard times come they stand together. Warped prespective maybe, but that is what I thought nursing was like.
Up until that conversation and a must say a glass of wine or two, I was ready to quite. I had spend many years getting the best education I could and fighting the establishment to get into school and convince people that nursing was the right thing for me to do at a 45+ person.
Alison put things into prespective and gave some insights into things I had not considered. She gave a postive outlook. She wanted us to step back out of the day to day negativity and look at the prespective. You must understand there were 6 nurses and one of her.
Alison made me think. She helped changed all the negative in something more positive. She has made some of you out there think about nursing. Alison has read all of your comments and she is quite amused:lol2: and enthused about all of this. She never thought that her simple idea could cause such discussion. Don't take it the wrong way after all she is a psychologist and is standing behind me as a write this. She was trying to help. Ailson's personal specialty is helping people find happiness in life and suggested reading "Happiness Now" by Robert Holden, PhD. She says it is very enlighting.
If my writing has sparked a thought, great, it raised me from being bummed to being able to get out of bed for work one more day. Change does not happen overnight, but if the food for thought is place, then change might just happen. Changes in the nursing profession might not happen in the next year or the next five years. Change is possible. Change can start with one person (if change is what we truly want). Take a look back into history, civil unrest and all the rest. You could be the one that starts the change.
I wanted to post something positive about nursing and that is what I did. Thanks for all of your comments and I look forward to reading anything more you all have to say.