I have to be bathed by my classmate???

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:imbar Ok call me old fashioned but I am kind of concerned. I had my nursing orientation today, and I was informed that as part of one of my practical nursing classes I will have to be sponge bathed by one of my classmates and in turn need to sponge bathe a classmate. Ok fine. No worries. HOWEVER, the next breath was, you will have to strip down to your underwear only and your classmate will drape you and sponge bathe you and vice versa. I understand that as a nurse I will give sponge baths to patients and I have no problem with that. But one of my classmates that I am going to spend hours and hours with for the next 2 years bathing me is a whole other story! True, like the instructor said it lets you know first hand how the patient will feel while you are abthing them, so you will want to treat them with dignity but being an overweight gal I am uncomfortable with this because I will have to look at these classmates for the next 2 years. Did anyone else ever do this as part of their curriculum? I don't mean to freak out but I never heard of this. They can stick me with all the needles they want for practice, but bathe the mannequins...lol :uhoh3:

This was one of our first sign off's was a bed bath and linen change. We were initially told in orientation underwear and bras...however, when we got in lab, they told us that sports bras and shorts were o.k. It wasn't as bad as I thought. I was covered up by a sheet the whole time and she did one extremity at a time.

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Specializes in orthopaedics, perioperative.
It's not as bad as doing Paps on each other. We had to do that as part of my NP training.

:chuckle I don't think I could ever do that right now. I'm hoping there weren't guys in your course cuz that would have been so unfair!

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Specializes in orthopaedics, perioperative.
I dunno abot this. Picking your battles? Stupid exercises? It is all part of training for patient care is it not? Same as learning to put in a Foley, range of motion, injections, etc. etc. etc. It's all part of the education :confused: I don't see the point of raising a fuss with what procedures you just have to learn as part of being a student.

I was not referring to the clinical procedures as being stupid. I was referring to the stupid things that us students had to do in lab, things which had no relevance to nursing. :)

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It's not as bad as doing Paps on each other. We had to do that as part of my NP training.

Wha??? There are alot of thing I would be willing to do, but a pap by one of my classmates is not one of them, lol.

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:idea: I think I'll take the bath!!

:chuckle :chuckle Me too! Where do I sign up?

Thanks for making me laugh. I had a baaad day!

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:chuckle I don't think I could ever do that right now. I'm hoping there weren't guys in your course cuz that would have been so unfair!

There was 1 guy..... we had his wife come in and be his partner. :)

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Specializes in Home Health Care.
You know - I always say that you tend to lose any and all modesty you have once you've given birth, so I guess you Moms know what I'm talking about. Really not too worried about it. Maybe just consider it a rite of initiation. :D

I totally agree! I'm not at all worried about being sponge bathed, I just hope they throw in a free massage :chuckle !

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we did that in our "lab" groups. no guy/gal thing, the guys were in one place, gals in another. we wore shorts and tank tops. i was really nervous about it and really dreading it, but it went really smoothly and was pretty painless!:) the only other thing we did to "each other" were ppd's. that to me was worse than the sponge bath by far!!! 30 inexperienced nursing students sticking each other with needles......ouch!:uhoh3:

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Sponge baths we did. They weren't nearly as bad as what we'd built them up to be. If you do it right, there really isn't an invasion of privacy.

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Specializes in ICU/CCU (PCCN); Heme/Onc/BMT.

We did the sponge bath thing with your class mate too. We wore shorts. Ladies wore some kind of top. And it was men/men, women/women. Still don't understand why manaquins weren't used, though. And we were not given a choice. Oh well.

I have a related story. . .

After getting my A. S. in nursing, I decided to go on and get the B. S. in nursing. One mandatory class was an advanced assessment class. At one point, we were going over the lung fields. Part of the "educational process" was knowing EXACTLY where the lung fields were on the body. In order to demonstrate our knowledge of knowing where the lung fields were on the body, we had to draw them on each other using a wash-off marking pen. Of course, this meant taking off our shirts, bra and all!! :eek:

Now. I was the ONLY male in the class. On the day that we were to do this rather dreaded part of the course, I had come to class a bit late. All of the females had paired off except for one who was later than I was to class! We were the last paired students obligated to draw lung fields on each other's bodies!

What was interesting was that she was in her late 60's. She already had her MSN and spent most of her nursing career as a DON for some healthcare facility. She was only taking this class for her own benefit.

Well, we did just fine with the whole "learning process", drawing and all. I was more nervous than she was, though. My hand was shaking as I drew the lines on her. . . errrrr. . . front. (The instructor was there watching, as she did for all the paired students, making sure I used the correct land marks on the body to ensure correct placement of the lung field lines.) Actually, she was totally cool with the whole deal! But it was wierd. I didn't like it one bit. Wish we didn't have to do it. And at that point in time for that particular college's nursing curriculum, it was manditory. At that time, there was no way getting around from doing this little "learning exercise".

And I was not too pleased when it came time for her to mark lung fields on my body! I'm a bit on the chubby side and I don't particularly like having people see my belly. . . :eek: HUMPH!!!

But we surived. I got an "A" in the course! AND I KNOW MY LUNG FIELDS!!! :)

Ted

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There was 1 guy..... we had his wife come in and be his partner. :)

She probably heard about it and insisted. :chuckle

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Yeah we had to do it too.

We were told to wear bathing suits and it was no bid deal. I would have bulked at the underwear thing though. It was more uncomfortable then bathing a patient or then being bathed by a nurse in the hospital but I can kind of see the logic in it.

My partner and I had known each other for years and well we both were a little uncomfortable. we managed to get threw the bath as well as the IM injections we practiced on each other in the ventral gludial site. We were of different genders so that added a little bit of stress to the whole thing.

All and all, I think if you object to it you will be let out of it. For us it wasn't worth the effort to fight it but I can see how it would bother other people and I think if it's that embarrassing to you, you should ask to be excused.

I however really agree with the practicing of IV's and injections on each other. This is something that every nurse should know how it feels when done correctly vs incorrectly. I also think it's a real confidence booster, when you walk into a room for that first real Iv start. You feel better knowing that you have at least once successfully started an IV. Add to that the fact that patients have a right not to be practice dummies and I'd have a hard time justifying a refusal practicing IV's on each other.

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