Do Male Nurses Get More Respect?

Published

In your experience, do male nurses get more respect from providers than females? I have seen examples of this, not always, but enough to make me wonder if it's widespread. How about you, what's your experience?

Specializes in Corrections, neurology, dialysis.

Depends on the man.

Although I have seen patients be total jerks to everyone on the floor, but the minute a man walks in the room, they settle down and cooperate. I had a patient who complained about everyone, saying nobody knew what they were doing, they're stupid,etc. Then at shift change when she got a make nurse, suddenly she was batting her eyes and cooing "oh everything is just fine". After she had been abusive to every single person who came near her that day. I've seen this more than once.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Corrections, neurology, dialysis.

However, that evolutionary "lizard" as I call it in the back of the MD's brain doesn't think like this. Not at all. It thinks "potential threat...better tone it down.".

Instinct and evolution almost always win unless EXTENSIVE training takes place to prevent it from winning.

All of this happens, likely, while the physician is completely unaware.

This is so true.

It it goes for patients as well. I have seen agitated, combative patient calm down if a man walks in the room. It's instinct. I realize there is nothin we can do about it. I'm just grateful to male nurses who are willing to help out and be a calming presence in those situations.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Corrections, neurology, dialysis.
I haven't worked with a lot of men but had a male worker I knew well. He was a PT. And a machine. He got up at 4:30, out the door at 5, at the gym at 6 (1 hr commute), at the office at 7, out in the field by 8 until 5-6, in bed by 8:30. 5 days a week. Yeah he out earned me who's still sipping coffee at 7:30.

None of our nurses work like that. All but me and another have grown kids but none of them work like that. None of them have that kind of sustained energy.

Is it a male thing? I don't know. We have a female PT who does the same thing except she runs 5 miles every morning and is as

productive as he is so maybe it's a personality/energy/work ethic thing that tends to run in the type of males that are drawn to nursing and PT of either sex. (Our PT's on average have been healthy and fit regardless of age, our nurses where I work on average are not, if you were to line up our nurses against our therapists, the differences are staggering). Just a possible theory.

ETA He was 10 years older than me, 55 to my 45 at the time.

i suspects to this their physical fitness and lifestyle choices giving them the energy.

I have noticed that I feel better and have more energy if I work out. It's counterintuitive to how you feel after a long shift. But I actually feel better if I do some kind of workout regularly. I also do a tiny upper body routine with little 3-pound weights and it makes all the difference in the world. I'm a woman and yet people are always asking me to help with lifting and transfers because I'm so strong. I almost never have pain, although some days are worse than others. So my little 10-minute routine three times a week makes my job a hundred times easier.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Can't count the number of times I have heard my male counterparts addressed as "Dr." or a female MD addressed as "Nurse".

Up Vote Up Vote ×

With all due respect to nursing in general....Nursing education and training really needs to be the same all across of the boards like most other healthcare professions. There is no standard and no norm. Nurses cannot identify with physicians and/surgeons because we are not and never will be physicians unless we go to medical school and complete a residency. That is a 4 year undergraduate degree(pre-med which consists of many difficult classes like organic chemistry and advanced calculus), 4 years or medical school, and a 3-7-9 year residency and fellowship if you choose to do so. So, right there is a minimum of 11 years of schooling and training as opposed to a 2 year associates degree for an entry level RN. That is why nurses do not get respect from many physicians. I have great respect for many physicians and surgeons. They have worked extremely hard and went through a lot more schooling than a nurse ever will, but that is because they are the physicians and they are the ones calling the shots because they have earned the right to do that. I do believe that we can work together as a team, however. It would be great if nursing could at least mandate a 4 year degree in order to practice as an RN. I think that many physicians do not give the RN the respect they deserve because there is no formality in the education process and there are many nurses who probably shouldn't be because they even skimmed by an associates program. I have heard CNA's refer to themselves as a nurse. There are just too many variables and too many levels of RN education. It can even be confusing to others when trying to explain the many different variables involved with nursing education. Nurses usually do not get a lot of respect from physicians and I do not see that changing anytime in the near future...unfortunately.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I'll tell you one thing I've seen. Sometimes the patients listen better to a male nurse! A few times the females at my job have tried to get patients to comply to one thing or another, and they flat out refused. Then we got a male in there, and they listened! Lol Go figure.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Can't count the number of times I have heard my male counterparts addressed as "Dr." or a female MD addressed as "Nurse".

Any particular generation or gender, or across the board?

Up Vote Up Vote ×
With all due respect to nursing in general....Nursing education and training really needs to be the same all across of the boards like most other healthcare professions. There is no standard and no norm. Nurses cannot identify with physicians and/surgeons because we are not and never will be physicians unless we go to medical school and complete a residency. That is a 4 year undergraduate degree(pre-med which consists of many difficult classes like organic chemistry and advanced calculus), 4 years or medical school, and a 3-7-9 year residency and fellowship if you choose to do so. So, right there is a minimum of 11 years of schooling and training as opposed to a 2 year associates degree for an entry level RN. That is why nurses do not get respect from many physicians. I have great respect for many physicians and surgeons. They have worked extremely hard and went through a lot more schooling than a nurse ever will, but that is because they are the physicians and they are the ones calling the shots because they have earned the right to do that. I do believe that we can work together as a team, however. It would be great if nursing could at least mandate a 4 year degree in order to practice as an RN. I think that many physicians do not give the RN the respect they deserve because there is no formality in the education process and there are many nurses who probably shouldn't be because they even skimmed by an associates program. I have heard CNA's refer to themselves as a nurse. There are just too many variables and too many levels of RN education. It can even be confusing to others when trying to explain the many different variables involved with nursing education. Nurses usually do not get a lot of respect from physicians and I do not see that changing anytime in the near future...unfortunately.

I have 5 yrs of university education to our clerical and CNA staff of zero yrs and I am not disrespectful to them.

It's a security issue. Secure individuals are neither disrespectful nor do they tolerate disrespect. If you have some sort of insecurity complex, because maybe you suck and/or you're getting your ass kicked in your personal life then you treat people you consider beneath you badly. If you're financially insecure with no strong safety net or your self esteem is fragile then you allow people to disrespect you.

I work with people who are respectful of each other due much to our leadership but if someone was blatantly disrespectful to me with no cause, I would have one of two reactions and both would make it clear of what I will not tolerate. I wish I'm could pass that on to nurses that struggle with their fears but unfortunately it's not something you can just give or teach someone.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I agree that BSN to entry is good and that is what IT is in Canada, but the attitude of some of my MD compatriots is rooted in history culture and training more than the level of training of nurses. Many medical schools and residency programs emphasize the Captain of the ship approach where we are the captains and everyone else follows our orders. It is emphasized that we are ultimately responsible for all aspect of care and this can produce a negative attitude. I believe it is improving I encourage the nurse involved in patients care to round with my team I expect them to participate and to speak up as part of that team. I am told that the nursing staff have noticed that the residences respect them and are more open to their input since I started this.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

More by the patients.

Less by management and coworkers.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in CVICU.
The bottom line is that wayyyy back in the human brain exists the axiom that violence is the ultimate law. This is why women like guys who are loud, obnoxious, "douche bags" (seriously, find a guy like that, and I bet he has a list of hot X's and a great looking girl with him at the time...). Those loud obnoxious people can typically "back it up", or they wouldn't be alive today. It appeals to the aspect of a woman's mind that is rooted in the faded annals of human history where a man's role was as a protector and provider first and foremost.

Also, other men recognize this. One man sees another, sizes him up, and that lizard in the back of the brain says "treat softly or this guy could break your face". The modern man may or may not give conscious voice to this evolution of thought, but it's there.

I think it only part of the human condition that the bluster of academic success will give way to the ancient but still pertinent evolutionary development of violence as the golden standard.

To that point, in 5 years of nursing, I have never once had a physician act rudely toward me in person, and only once or twice on the phone---which they apologized for right afterwards.

So, yes, I feel that being a strong alpha male does get me more respect as a nurse, after observing how the same physicians treat female nurses in my environment.

Does it mean male nurses deserve more respect? No. But just like the douche bag in the bar may not "deserve" the girl he's with...he's still with 'er!

You took the words right out of my mouth. I've been saying this for years. It may not be right, but it is what it is.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

In terms of respect from patients and their families/loved ones, I would say yes. However, I can tell you unequivocally that male nurses are routinely discriminated against from the day they enter nursing school until the day they leave the field. I was systematically harassed and blatantly discriminated against when I first tried to go through a local RN program by two nursing instructors who I later learned were described as "men haters". They were overheard by many students lamenting that only women used to get into nursing and now that the pay went up, they were angry because men started flocking into the field. They can't get you academically if you are book smart, so where they get you is in clinical check offs and clinicals themselves. During a check off, you can hear them coaching or reminding the female nurses when they forgot or messed up, but when men went in to get checked off, you had better remember everything and not make the slightest mistake. They are more likely to shadow you during clinicals, this one guy was kicked out of the program because he left a bar of soap in the wash basin after giving a bed bath (!!). They harass men with a viscious double standard and try to put additional pressure on us with clinicals and those care plans. Mine were always articulate and detailed, but would come back with a ton of red ink and always needed "revision". When I looked at the care plans of the other female nursing students, they were general and simplistic and that nursing instructor who was harassing me saw us comparing notes and told the other students "I don't think its a good idea for you to be comparing notes". In other words, she made no secret about her double standard and the implied threat was "help him and you'll be next". These are true stories, and if men try to go somewhere to complain about this flagrant sexism, it is suggested that they have an overactive imagination or that they are too sensitive and of course, good luck proving you are being harassed or discriminated against. So if you somehow are allowed to graduate then you enter the work force. I haven't experienced as much discrimination in hiring, but once a man gets on the floor, watch out. It doesn't take much to get fired as a male nurse, women managers like to make it look like they are tough and "kicking some butt" by going after the largest alpha male first. Being a huge, strong man I have found the DONs and other management maggots are harsher with their words, quicker to write men up and/or terminate them. The last LTC facility I was at, the DON would say HI and be all pleasant to the nurse on the other side, but would wait for me to walk by her office so she could hurl a dagger at me. Something nasty, threatening, or sarcastic. When I asked her a year or so later (after they fired her) why she said she didn't even know she was doing it, that it was her way of making continue to do an "outstanding job" (the other nurse dumped half of her work off on me, another routine occurrence) and that she was sorry and all that. I am an adult, I don't need to be continuously threatened and harassed in order to do a good job. There is so much more I could talk about, but the library closes soon. Make no mistake about it. Men are routinely harassed and discriminated against in the nursing field. I am living proof

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion