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I'm still a nursing student, but I do still wear my wedding rings during my clinicals. I think it depends on how comfortable you are with it. And how large the setting might be on the engagement ring.It might make it more likely to hurt a patient with it. I think the wedding band is fine, but might refrain from wearing the engagement ring just for safety reasons.
I wear my wedding band but not my engagement ring. I work in an ICU where I have to do a 2 minute surgical scrub at the beginning of each shift and the only hand/wrist jewelery we're supposed to be allowed to wear is a plain band.
While I am a bit jealous of my friends' fancy diamond-encrusted wedding bands or combo wedding band/engagement ring settings...I still chose to get the plain band so I wouldn't have to take it off. These bands look nice with either diamond solitaires or three-stone rings like mine. When I was engaged I safety-pinned my diamond ring to my ID badge and scrub top.
It's not worth the risk of infection - both to your patients and to you! Lots of germs can get trapped in ornate rings!
Here's some recent threads on this topic...
https://allnurses.com/forums/f8/wedding-rings-work-158276.html?highlight=wedding+ring
https://allnurses.com/forums/f98/silly-question-wedding-rings-155093.html?highlight=wedding+ring
I just recently became engaged about 6 months ago. I wear my engagement ring and another silver band on my right hand. I feel funny without them. I tried not wearing it and I'd notice that my ring was gone and my heart would leap into my throat thinking I'd lost it! I had enough of heart palps and decided to wear it. =)
We are allowed to wear plain wedding bands but not any other rings. It's right because of infection control.
If I've been off & got to work before remembering to take my engagement ring off I have a small & very deep top pocket in my uniform where I can safely put it until the end of my shift.
KLeigh
23 Posts
Do you wear your wedding / engagement rings to work? In what setting do you work (hospital, doctor's office, etc)? Newlywed here, just curious!!
I just got married in July, and didn't wear my rings to work on the hospital unit I'd been workng at for 4 years (they all knew I was married, so I didn't care), but I just started a new job at a different hospital, and I almost feel bad not wearing my rings (like I'm betraying my new hubby or something...haha I know that's probably dumb, but I'm just curious how other folks do it). So far, I've been wearing my wedding band and not my engagement ring, and I work on a M/S unit in a hospital.