I Fear for the Future of Nursing

I read Allnurses every day, rarely do I post. Over the past year or so I've been reading more and more about how hard "that first year of nursing" is and how many new nurses just can't handle it and are looking to get out. I understand. Nurses Announcements Archive Article

I Fear for the Future of Nursing

As an old, seasoned nurse, now retired I have watched nursing get harder and harder, working with sicker and sicker patients with less resources. How long can this continue? I've read lately about nurses who need antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds just to be able to come to work each day. And we all nod and say that's just how nursing is now. I read about nurses who cry and dread each day that they have to come to work, working in fear of making a mistake. The horror, a human being might make a mistake. And then I read other nurses who say, "we should never make mistakes, we should triple/quadruple check everything we do because the poor patient should not be harmed in any way, ever." What utopia do they live in? And yet we have to drop everything that we are triple checking to run and get a family member an extra pillow or a soft drink or risk being reprimanded.

What other career puts such a burden on it's members? I can't think of any that routinely have members dreading to come to work and needing medications to get through a shift, maybe airtraffic controllers, or combat soldiers. I don't know.

And then we tell ourselves that we should be happy that we're lucky to have a job. Really? What is so lucky about this?

I started nursing 40 years ago on a busy labor and delivery unit. I was afraid at times. But there was a support system from the top down. Director of nursing, nursing supervisors, head nurses (they weren't called managers back then) and the shift charge nurse, everyone pulled together. I miss that. I left hospital bedside nursing 10 years ago because of the lack of support and teamwork, and the increasing focus on the patient "experience" versus a positive outcome of disease or injury.

I don't have an answer, well I do but for some reason, nurses I have known don't want to talk about solving problems for their profession. We're great at solving everyone else's problems but not our own. How long can this continue? I feel sorry for new nurses and for my older colleagues as well.

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nurse42long

About nurse42long, RN

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As a soon to be new grad, I am actually feeling terrified about what the future holds. I have also seen the threads about depression, dread, anxiety, and burnout. And many of these appear to be from newish nurses. I try to reason with myself that just like everything in life those that are unhappiest are the ones that speak up. Kind of like a bad experience in a restaurant. Poor service? The whole world hears about it. Exceptional meal and service you maybe only tell one person about it. Is it possible we just aren't hearing from those that are having an exceptional nursing career? I am going to try to hold on to that hope...otherwise I am not sure why I would even want to graduate and start my first rn job. Putting on my rose colored glasses now and hoping for the best...

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Specializes in Allergy/ENT, Occ Health, LTC/Skilled.

I have been an LPN for over 5 years now and am 18 months out from hopefully graduating with my RN. The posts on here have worried me. I have always wanted to work in the hospital but seeing my friends who have worked on hospitals and to hear at the end of that one year they despise it...is discouraging. LTC has gotten worse and worse as years have gone on. I returned recently to do PRN while in school and have found we are there to please the patient's family and not the patient's themselves. It's strange thinking. All about customer experience but we still have a 1:25 ratio. I am hoping, one day, we can unionize and bring nursing back to what is used to be in the beginning of your career but I don't see how that can happen with there being so many nurses to choose from.

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Specializes in Med/Surg/ICU/Stepdown.

I commend and agree with your post. Nursing, while noble and a worthwhile career, can also be soul-crushing and demoralizing.

I have likened my career/nursing to an emotionally abusive relationship; things get better temporarily after much crying, protesting, and threats to quit .. and then returns to exactly it's previous state. I have tried to constructively make my unit progressive; I have come up with suggestions, actionable plans, and even been the volunteer as an agent for change, and yet I am consistently met with "JCHACO .." or "surveys indicate," as responses. It is purely exhausting.

Nursing was my choice, as it was for many. It wasn't a degree I fell into for any reason; I actively chose it. And I do still choose it every single day. I realize that I continue to be a bedside nurse for no other reason than my own choosing. But it has burned me out both physically and emotionally. For example: I was hurt at work over a year ago--doing my job--and I requested a voluntary LOA (not by choice; I didn't qualify for FMLA) for surgery. Because I was not FMLA eligible, I returned to work following a very nicely worded threat for my position, as it was not protected. I am now on a limited duty schedule and I am dying from the repercussions. I put my heart, body, and brain into a job that every day gives me nothing in return (other than the occasional satisfaction I receive from assisting a genuinely ill person to get better).

I LOVE being a nurse ... and I'm all for change. But how? Where does it start? If anyone has a suggestion, I'm all ears. Until then, this is the only area in my life that I can carry optimism. I *have* to tell myself that it *has* to get better. Doesn't it?

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Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.

Personally, I'm amazed at how many nurses are still functioning well in this crazy environment. I burned out several years ago and continuing beyond that point wrecked my mental health. I retired from active nursing on the last day of December 2013, and can't imagine ever being able to come back. I admire the nurses who can go to work every day in the face of overwhelming stress and do a good job anyway. And I know most of you do. :up:

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Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.

I am actively in the process of attempting to leave bedside nursing. It is simply becoming too much work for too little reward.

As long as everything progresses satisfactorily with the background check, I will be starting a work-at-home job next month. I desperately need the change in scenery.

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Specializes in Pediatric Oncology, Pediatric Neurology.

Your post gave me chills. I've been a nurse now for a year and when I reflect on the past year I realize how much I've changed as a nurse and as a person as a whole outside of work. This profession can either enable you to grow wings or it will tear you down. I've been in both of those places at various times, sometimes in the same day. But in the end, I know my worth and stand up for what I believe in, not allowing myself to become stagnant from the various obstacles of the day What helps me is to reflect each day- whether it be on my drive home or during that hour-long shower I tend to take on those awful days when I can't hold back the tears.

At the end of every hour of every shift, we are human beings- but we also must be mindful of the image we portray of ourselves as nurses. Nursing is a Profession, and We are Professionals. I've seen too many instances of nurses short-changing themselves. We as nurses have dedicated our lives to our profession and it started in nursing school. We sat for hours in theory classes trying to comprehend information that may as well have been in a foreign language. We rewired our brains. We put ourselves out there and stepped completely out of our comfort zones during clinical rotations- shoulders up, "look the part", and deal with some of those not-so-helpful seasoned nurses along with many other challenges Id rather not revisit at the moment. We absorbed it all (well-most of it) and somehow managed to survive.

Then...we sat for that dreaded exam, screen shut off and were convinced we failed. Then we became LICENSED NURSES!

Now this is when stuff got really real- we went out into the world, landed our first job and realized we knew absolutely NOTHING. But, we survived, and we learned and we learned some more and we continue to learn everyday. Because we are nurses!

Nothing in life will be ideal- especially in the world of healthcare. We are dealing with critically ill people at the lowest points in their lives, this isn't new news. At all. We all knew this going in. We can't change it. We can change how we allow it to change- or transform us.

You HAVE to be a strong person to be a nurse, you have to LOVE it and understand that it isn't going to fulfill you unless you see the beauty of what it means to truly help others whether there's something there in return for you or not.

We can not change the way patients, families, nursing "leaders", the Joint Commission (etc...), or other nurses treat us. We can not change the plethora of "rules" we must follow and adhere to but we can portray ourselves as professionals who have earned the right to the title. I think nursing as a whole needs to advocate for our profession- but also have our hearts in the right place- maybe then things will change.

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Nurses need to unionize en masse with the National Nurses United, and seize control over our profession.

The PTB will not relinquish control voluntarily. We have to take it ourselves.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN (ret)

Somewhere in the PACNW

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Specializes in Behavioral Health.

Burn out, injury, depression, stress... working in healthcare can be bad for you. I've posted a couple of times now about research showing that a significant number of nurses leave the field within two years, and report being retired at earlier ages than most fields. I don't know what the solution is for everyone else, we all have to find that for ourselves, but mine is away from the bedside.

What other career puts such a burden on it's members? I can't think of any that routinely have members dreading to come to work and needing medications to get through a shift, maybe airtraffic controllers, or combat soldiers. I don't know.

This is not to diminish the strain of nursing in any way, but there are a lot of fields with high rates of depression and suicide, we just don't hear about them because we're not in them. Bus drivers have a particularly hard go of it (see the previous link), and if there's an allbusdrivers.com I bet it's hopping with posts about antidepressants, leg cramps, and abuse by passengers. Which is, again, not to minimize the difficulty of nursing. It's just to say that we may perceive the dangers of nursing as more frequent or more likely because we're more aware of them (an effect called the availability heuristic), when in fact there are a lot of industries where people simply aren't getting the support they need to function optimally.

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I commend and agree with your post. Nursing, while noble and a worthwhile career, can also be soul-crushing and demoralizing.

I have likened my career/nursing to an emotionally abusive relationship; things get better temporarily after much crying, protesting, and threats to quit .. and then returns to exactly it's previous state. I have tried to constructively make my unit progressive; I have come up with suggestions, actionable plans, and even been the volunteer as an agent for change, and yet I am consistently met with "JCHACO .." or "surveys indicate," as responses. It is purely exhausting.

That is a brilliant analogy and truly how it feels at times

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Specializes in Family Medicine.

Yup, it pretty much sucks.

I wanted to break a wine bottle (by shattering on my concrete patio) after a shift last week. It was a low point, to say the least.

I did not proceed with the deed. I slammed a cabinet instead and felt better. I would never hurt a living being (I dropped a spider off at the forest preserve once), I feel better after I throw things though.

This is why I'm in grad school. Can't do this much longer.

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After reading all these posts, the only conclusion I have is that I must work at an amazing hospital. I don't really get stressed, I give patients meds, I help them with ADLS, I chart my assessment etc. I don't really feel this soul-crushing environment.

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