The Today Show

Nurses General Nursing

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Anyone watch this morning? Their medical expert was on giving tips to patients on how to prevent errors while they are in the hospital.

One thing she mentioned was that hospitals (nurses especially) need to go back to being more professional. She mentioned nurses wearing caps or at least going back to wearing white in order to be distinguished from other hospital staff. Matt Laur said he had recently been in the hospital and that nurses are dressing much to casually. Hmmmmmm.......................

Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.

You may feel differntly when you have earned nyour BSN.:nono:

And then again some do not feel differently about the issue being a dead horse.

And now, shall we get back on topic?

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Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.
And then again some do not feel differently about the issue being a dead horse.

And now, shall we get back on topic?

AMEN!!

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Specializes in ER, ICU, Infusion, peds, informatics.

i have to agree with the posters who advocate for our titles (rn, lpn, dietary, housekeeping....) to be displayed prominantly, somewhere highly visable.

i have heard the suggestion about arm patches, but that would be a pain in the butt to sew onto all of your uniform tops.

my suggestion would to have a name badge with your picture, first name, and title displayed on both sides. with the title being the largest item on the name badge. none of the extraneous stuff need be there. or if it is, it could be in small print (such as your hospital id number).

placing this info on both side of the name badge would solve the badge-flipping-over issue. which, by the way, happened to me all the time when i used the name tag holders the drug reps give us. no matter what i did, i couldn't get that sucker to stay on right. (now, i do realize that some flip their badges over on purpose, and having the info printed on both sides would solve that problem, too.)

on the other hand......as another poster put it, i think part of the problem is that some hospitals don't want the public to know what the role/title of some ancillary staff is. i'm not sure how much help it will be to have titles prominently displayed when the patient doesn't know what in the world a "pct" is (patient care tech, a title i had while in nursing school; basically a cna that is trained to do additional procedures). we have paramedics that work in the er, but we don't call them paramedics. a shame, since i think that title is a respected one, and most patients would be happy to have one assisting with their care. however, i'm not so sure the same public would be so thrilled to have a nursing assistant placing their foley. i don't necessarily mean that properly trained cnas arn't competent to place a foley, but this is a task most people would expect to be done by a nurse, not an aide. it is more cost-effective to train non-licensed staff to do some procedures. i'm not so sure that the same hospital administrators that are eager to write policies allowing non-licensed employees to perform these tasks are quite as eager to let the public know about it.

there ya go, everyone. back on topic :nurse:

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Specializes in LTC, Med Surg, HH.

CritterLover, I agree with you 100%. Thank you.

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elisheva wrote:

Go ahead, flame me for it, but I wore all whites 10 years ago. Often, I wore white dress uniforms, even - oh, yes, I'll say it, the hose! No cap, though. Maybe it was just my imagination or my "legend in my own self-important mind", but I felt I commanded more respect - not because my uniform was white - but because patients knew who and what I was!

There's something to be said for a uniform and a polished look: policemen know it, the military knows it. It says I belong to a group of professionals who had to pay a price to get where they are.

Shoot me. I liked it.

I like this thinking too. As a new nurse just one year out of college I know what it was like to wear an all white uniform, with pleated pants, button down tunic with collar and all white shoes for 2 years of clinical. I can't tell you how many times I was given more respect than the seasoned nurses taking care of the patients and nobody ever mistook me for anything but a nurse. I would have to explain to the patients that I was a "student nurse" but they always knew I was a nurse. I hate to say it, but there were a couple of instances when patients who were anxious or upset would say "I want to talk to the nurse, the one in the white uniform" or "I want the nurse in white to help me" . . .etc.

As much as we hate it the reality is that the easiest way for people to distinguish a nurse is by the traditional all white color. I had clinicals in places where the nurses wore very large yellow nametags that would hang down beyond their hospital badge with their first name and RN written in 1 inch bold letters. We all know that many hospitals have the grease boards in the room where the nurse's name and the nurse's aids names (and sometimes the charge nurse name) are written. I don't know that any of this really helps. As far as patches stating a position, I wore the college of nursing patch on the arm of my student uniform and a nametag saying I was a student nurse . . .and still patients would automatically identify me as an RN . . simply based on the white uniform.

Unfortunately the dress code for nurses in my current hospital job is all navy or a combo of navy/white. All white is not permitted because it's for students only.

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I have been nursing for 33 years. Wore all white,a cap for a long time and even the dreaded white hose. I worked very hard back then as I do now.Often way too big patient load. Med errors were made then too but the difference now I think is that the meds errors can be more serious. Just look at the number of meds out there and more being introduced everyday. More complicated procedures and a more demanding patient population. I don't remember my patients expecting me to be their personal maid then or want me toprovide all their friends with snacks etc. Of course we always had what were called aides who were a great help!! I think it is Christmas if I have a tech now.The patients knew who was who.

I don't want to go back to all white and definitely not a cap though I was proud of it. Clearer tags are a good idea, I like the suggestion of the info being the same on both sides. I know alot of nurses who purposely turn over their tags because they don't like their pictures. However I would not stop nursing because they made me wear a certain color, no matter what is. We are waiting now at our hospital to hear what the dress code will be, I guess our administration saw the Today Show too.

I was very upset at first when I was told we were going to have to change into color coded uniforms at the first of the year. However, I have been thinking, Maybe everyone will be able to see how few nurses we have!!Although I agree it is important to tell nurses apart from housekeeping,it is more important to have adequate staffing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.
My suggestion would to have a name badge with your picture, first name, and title displayed on BOTH SIDES.

This makes sense.

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Specializes in ICU, ER, Hemodialysis.

My suggestion would to have a name badge with your picture, first name, and title displayed on BOTH SIDES. With the title being the largest item on the name badge. None of the extraneous stuff need be there. Or if it is, it could be in small print (such as your hospital ID number).

Placing this info on both side of the name badge would solve the badge-flipping-over issue. Which, by the way, happened to me all the time when I used the name tag holders the drug reps give us. No matter what I did, I couldn't get that sucker to stay on right. (Now, I do realize that some flip their badges over on purpose, and having the info printed on both sides would solve that problem, too.)

My hospital does this, but some "clever" nurses/pca's put other cards on the same tag holder and then flip them over so that pt's can not see their id's. I changed the holder that came with my name badge for one that does not flip around at all (even though at my present job that is a non-issue).

I think that the solution is to go into the room and identify yourself to the pt and let them know who you are and what you are going to do. Even without my name tag, pt's know exactly what my name is, what my title is, and what I am going to do for them. All it cost me is a moment of my time and an extra bit of courtesy to the pt.

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Specializes in GERIATRICS, DEMENTIA CARE, MED-SURG.

Seems like unacceptable behavior to me...............also very juvenile

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Specializes in OR.

I think the doc's main concern is that she's probably been called a nurse because she's a woman. If nurses were forced to wear those stupid caps, she wouldn't have that problem. Just because someone's a woman and a doctor doesn't mean that they have respect for nurses-in my experience, they've been some of the worst offenders!

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Does anyone wear nurse uniform patches like those offered by the Center for Nursing Advocacy? What's the reaction to them? I'd think they'd solve the problem of identifying a nurse pretty easily.

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Specializes in Emergency, Med-Surg, L&D, Tele.

briefly saw the segment...i was horrified to hear the "doctor" tell matt that she had called the ed and they were "waiting" for her and her asthmatic daughter. is that reality? :rolleyes: wonder how many "reservations" the ed will be taking today:-)

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