Do you wear different scrubs for psych?

[angelfire280]

.... As in, do you wear different colors or avoid certain scrubs when working in psych?

I just got my first nursing job as an LPN at a psych ward. One of the roughest in the area, actually. I am buying my first non-white scrubs (finally), but I wondered if the color you wear has an effect on your patients. For instance, I'm staying away from red, even though I love the color, because of all the negative feelings it's reported to provoke. I'm also avoiding pastels, even though I'm a girly girl, because I fear that the more uncontrolled patients might see me as soft or whatever.

I was aiming for green, navy, blue, and purple. Am I being silly here, or does this stuff actually matter?

[elkpark]

It has been several decades since the phasing out of uniforms in psych institutions for the apparent therapeutic benefits for patients. I have to tried to find research that could support this theory but have not manged to find recent material. Can anyone help here? cheers

I did a serious lit search on this topic several years ago, when the inpt psych program in which I was the CNS was considering a switch to scrubs. I found nothing recent -- no one is researching or writing about the subject; I guess because it's been considered a "done deal" for a few decades now in psych.

[marilynmom, LPN, NP]

I work psych and we all wear navy scrubs.

[Meriwhen, ASN, BSN, MSN, RN]

I can wear any scrubs I want so long as they're not offensive...as far as scrubs can be offensive, anwyay :)

The nurses at my facility wear a variety of colors and print designs--I've seen it all. There's even an occasional nurse wearing all white (talk about NS flashbacks!)

Personally, I tend towards dark, solid color tops with black cargo pants...though I can be caught wearing the occasional print.

[Orca, ADN, ASN, RN]

On the units I've worked on I had the option of wearing either street clothes or scrubs. I chose the former. (For Halloween we dressed in uniforms, which our patients got a kick out of.) The only advice we got about scrubs was not to wear anything that has faces or animals on it, because hallucinating patients might find it disturbing.

[mobo]

I'm very interested in knowing why people wear scrubs vs street clothes on a psych unit? (And I'm not posting this at 3:54 AM as my computer is showing)

I teach psych nursing, and students ask why?

[Whispera, MSN, RN]

Psych staff people wear street clothes because "white coats" have a stigmatized thing about them, patients feel more comfy if the staff doesn't look all "staff-y," and mostly because, often, the attitude is that of teamwork, with the patient being a big part of the team, and wearing uniforms or scrubs or white jackets can make people feel there's "us," and then there's "them."

[elkpark]

Psych staff people wear street clothes because "white coats" have a stigmatized thing about them, patients feel more comfy if the staff doesn't look all "staff-y," and mostly because, often, the attitude is that of teamwork, with the patient being a big part of the team, and wearing uniforms or scrubs or white jackets can make people feel there's "us," and then there's "them."

This came out of the humanistic psychology movement of the '50s and '60s. The idea was to decrease the barriers between clients and staff, and emphasize our common humanity and similarities. I have been in the biz long enough that I remember when the ideal on psych units was that you couldn't tell the staff from the clients by looking (I remember when we were all v. upset that JCAHO started making us wear name tags -- we felt that created an artificial barrier and hierarchy between the staff and clients. Prior to that, you really couldn't tell who was who just by looking) and many visitors and family members over the years have assumed I was a client -- until they asked to speak with the charge nurse (moi).

I think the trend back toward uniforms in psych settings is partly a result of the large influx of people (workers) who aren't serious, long-time psych folks and don't share those values, and partly a result of the "remedicalization" of psychiatric settings (inpatient units, at least). We've moved v. far away from the "therapeutic community" model and back to a model where inpatient treatment is mostly about medicating people -- v. little therapy or community.

[NPvampire, MSN, RN, APRN]

I've worked all kinds of settings, from "nice business clothes only" to scrubs of a certain color that all nurses in the hospital wore (but not white) to "anything goes that isn't profanity..."

I usually wear animal or cartoon scrubs b/c my first few jobs were child & adolescent...most people like them. Haven't had anyone hallucinate on me yet--not for my scrubs, anyway.

I, for one, do not like the "street clothes" policy because some people dress very inappropriately, or IMO stupidly (high heels for psych??!!) and management does nothing about it.

[mentalhealthRN]

I have worked in two different hospital psych units and the first, an inpatient adult unit the nurses wore white scubs on top and white or navy scrubs on the bottom. (The techs in all navy scrubs). That was throughout the hospital including our psych unit. At the other I was in the Psych ER and we could wear either street clothes or scrubs of any color. Interesting that I didn't find there to be any difference in the effect on the patients. It was more the attitude, demenor and approach of the nurse than what she/he was wearing.

[NYRN08]

I work in a facility wear we have to wear a collared blue shirt and beige khaki pants. I do not like it at all. I would just rather wear what I wore in my psych rotation in nursing school. I feel out of place when I have to float to med-surg, peds/surgical floor and those nurses are all in white. All the patients ask me, who are you?? Even though my badge is on and above my waist. (we are not allowed to have the badge on your belt or bottom shirt area. It must be displayed at eye view.

My other facility(which I start on Monday) they have a choice to wear either scrubs or pants and a nice shirt. Just as long as it is appropriate.

[PsychRN98, ASN]

At the freestanding psych hospital I used to work at, most people wore street clothes. Could even be sweats on the night shift if you wanted to. The night call docs wore them all the time, and slippers. And would actually come and eval pts. looking like that. It was pretty funny! In the psych unit I worked at most recently, which was attached to a medical hospital, and had more medically compromised and geripsych pts, most staff wore scrubs. However if you wanted to you could wear nice khakis or black slacks, kind of business casual, but few did.