At least in my opinion. In my Assessment class we are required to take our shirts off (the girls can wear sports bras) for the cardiac, respiratory, and abdominal assessments. When, I was young and in shape doing this would have merely made me uncomfortable. Now that I'm middleaged, obese, and generally disgusting it is down right humiliating. I don't take my shirt off even in front of my wife, and I never even look at myself in the mirror when I get out of the shower without a shirt on. You can argue that this is not logical and might even be pathological, but I would assert that it's also my right. These feelings are exasperated by the fact that most of the students I am forced to work with are female between the ages of 18 and 22. Many will say that this teaches empathy for what patients have to go through all the time. This may or may not be the case, but there is one crucial difference. Patients, generally have the right to refuse any assessment, treatment, or procedure without being punished. As students it can be argued that we have such a right, but the price is that we fail if it is exercised (it would be like a school asserting that they don't require students to say the Pledge so long as they don't mind receiving an "F"). Although, this is not the situation in my case, I know of one person who's religious beliefs prevent her from being exposed in front of others in this manner. Thus, in her case her religious freedoms were also being impinged upon.
If nothing else they should offer the opportunity to be excused from the exercise (at least in terms of being examined). If this meant finding a "replacement", I would gladly be willing to shell out several hundred dollars to avoid the humiliation if this is what it took to find someone willing to be assessed in my place (and when I was younger, and in shape would have probably done it for $20.00 despite being shy).
I wonder if anyone has ever brought successful legal challenges to schools based upon this sort of objection?
I'm pretty surprised that you have to practice half naked as well....it wouldn't go over very well in my school. We practiced on dummies in our skill lab and got signed off there before doing it in the hospital. We were also able to practice on each other with OOB to the chair, wound care, bowel sounds, etc. but we never did anything more than roll up a sleeve or show a little belly, and it was a voluntary thing. Don't you have clinicals in a hospital setting? Aren't you supposed to assess a real patient with a real diagnosis? How will you ever know what a real S3 sounds like ro real crackles or wheezing? The tapes just aren't the same as real life...and I'm sure you won't hear it on your healthy classmates either.
I, personally, wouldn't be able to disrobe in front of most of the people who were in my first, and even second semester, clinicals...a lot of people failed or dropped out between then and now. I would have felt violated. I understand that the patient may feel that way as well, but they are a patient in a hospital...it is expected and we go to extremes to try to make the patient feel comfortable and that their privacy is respected. I understand the empathy standpoint, but most of us have been patients in a doctor's office or a hospital and have experienced the embarrassment of taking our clothes off for a physical...I don't need to be taught that in an early clinical course.
Maybe I'm being naive and I must admit, I'm a bit uninformed because it's not the norm where I live, but on first reading of this thread, I was kind of shocked that it is practiced so often at other schools. My mom went to Nursing school over 30 yrs ago and they used to practice injections on each other...I'm glad that the times have changed....
But, Roland, maybe if you ask the instructor if it can be a more private experience, maybe break you all up into groups of 3 or 4 and allow hospital gowns to be worn...I bet more people will like your idea and side with you, maybe you'll get to change the way things are done....GOOD LUCK!
Specializes in LTC, Acute care, Oncology, Public Health.
Roland I absolutely agree with you. I am in first semester currently doing physical assessments. We are lectured, practice on dummies and then use clinicals for the experience. We are encouraged to go home and practice these skills with our family, where it wouldn't be uncomfortable. Side note: my husband thought he was going to get sponge bathed for practice, imagine his surprise when I came home with needles instead. Of course I didn't use them, but I thoroughly enjoyed scaring him. I would be mortified to have a fellow classmate see me in that situation. These are people that I am going to be in close enough contact with for the next two years, without knowing them intimately. I do however see the point for either way. I am just glad I'm not in the bathing suit group. I think that also proves how much you really want to be a nurse. God bless you guys who endured that for your goal.
Actually, an employer can make you do lots of things that you might feel infringes on your legitimate religious beliefs (like make you work on Sunday) and our choice is to find another job. So this argument is not likely to wash. Next.....
This is probably not a good road to go down, because when you start talking about damage you are moving in the direction of lawsuit. I think we can all agree that's a point of no return. At the very least, we can probably agree that this is something that would separate you from the good graces of your school and the nursing school administration, permanently. So let's not go there, either.
There's a big difference. Those were "invasive" procedures. A bedbath (and if they didn't wash in your "bathing suit area" especially) isn't invasive, and neither is a physical assessment. Invasive procedures have the potential for introducing bacteria and therefore causing infection. I know you see the difference.
We do. Go to the NSNA website and find the Student's Bill of Rights. You'll be surprised what you find in there. Maybe something will be helpful.
Roland. Roland!! ROLAND!!! Read my earlier post above. I think it is your strongest argument.
Good luck and calm down. It's going to be OK.
We were told in my Business Law class that an employer generally CANNOT make you work on Sunday, if it is against your religion or sincere personal belief (with certain exceptions such as Police Officers and the military). It was said that this emanated from first amendment free exercise, and 14th Amendment equal protection case law. We were also told that case law basically made them make "reasonable accomodations" that vary depending upon what Federal circuit you are located within. In addition, having worked several managment positions (lower level) at larger companies in the past we would also make excepetions based upon religious belief. For instance at Pizza Hut we had two Jewish employees who would not work on Saturday, nor would they handle (touch) Pork products. We were advised that we had to give them Saturday's off AND place them in jobs where they wouldn't have to touch pork products (which was essentially everyplace except for the production line usually we put them on cashier or drive up window duty.)
At least in my opinion. In my Assessment class we are required to take our shirts off (the girls can wear sports bras) for the cardiac, respiratory, and abdominal assessments. When, I was young and in shape doing this would have merely made me uncomfortable. Now that I'm middleaged, obese, and generally disgusting it is down right humiliating. I don't take my shirt off even in front of my wife, and I never even look at myself in the mirror when I get out of the shower without a shirt on. You can argue that this is not logical and might even be pathological, but I would assert that it's also my right. These feelings are exasperated by the fact that most of the students I am forced to work with are female between the ages of 18 and 22. Many will say that this teaches empathy for what patients have to go through all the time. This may or may not be the case, but there is one crucial difference. Patients, generally have the right to refuse any assessment, treatment, or procedure without being punished. As students it can be argued that we have such a right, but the price is that we fail if it is exercised (it would be like a school asserting that they don't require students to say the Pledge so long as they don't mind receiving an "F"). Although, this is not the situation in my case, I know of one person who's religious beliefs prevent her from being exposed in front of others in this manner. Thus, in her case her religious freedoms were also being impinged upon.
If nothing else they should offer the opportunity to be excused from the exercise (at least in terms of being examined). If this meant finding a "replacement", I would gladly be willing to shell out several hundred dollars to avoid the humiliation if this is what it took to find someone willing to be assessed in my place (and when I was younger, and in shape would have probably done it for $20.00 despite being shy).
I wonder if anyone has ever brought successful legal challenges to schools based upon this sort of objection?
In my NP education we were required to do pelvic and paps on one another. Our male colleague brought his wife in as his lab partner. No one balked- it made us aware of what our patients are feeling during an exam.
i have been told by my aunt who graduated from a diploma program many years ago that they had to practice starting catheters on one another, and do blood draws on fellow students as well. she said this practice was finally stopped after osha stepped in.
:uhoh21: omg!!! catheters!?! now that is definately where i would have drawn the line. i graduated in '86 and we practiced blood draws and starting iv's on each other and we were encouraged to bring the equipment home to practice as well. my poor husband gave up all his veins in my attempts. god bless him :rotfl:
finally, i would add that while i'm sure the stress that you, and many other students felt was real, that it is exponentially amplified among those with certain personality types who happen to be out of shape, and middleaged. this is especially the case when they are put in a situation of dealing with those much younger than them in this context.
i feel for you, roland. and hope you can come up with some way that you can be passed on these skills while not feeling humiliated. let us know how it goes, o.k.?
In my NP education we were required to do pelvic and paps on one another. Our male colleague brought his wife in as his lab partner. No one balked- it made us aware of what our patients are feeling during an exam.
Since, by the time you get to NP education, you probably have been a patient (I certainly have, thoroughly, for 34 years), it hardly makes sense, if that was the only reason. I know what patients feel during an exam, having been on the receiving end many, many times.
It also sounds as though the classmate's wife was the one who got the empathy lesson.
Seems like there are plenty of teaching hospitals and public clinics where students are normally placed for clinical rotations. In fact, as a foster parent of teenaged girls, we used a public health clinic. They were well cared for by a NP, and her students occasionally did my girls' exams.
There was no shortage of patient's needing care, and most were happy to help students learn.
We were told in my Business Law class that an employer generally CANNOT make you work on Sunday, if it is against your religion or sincere personal belief (with certain exceptions such as Police Officers and the military). It was said that this emanated from first amendment free exercise, and 14th Amendment equal protection case law. We were also told that case law basically made them make "reasonable accomodations" that vary depending upon what Federal circuit you are located within. In addition, having worked several managment positions (lower level) at larger companies in the past we would also make excepetions based upon religious belief. For instance at Pizza Hut we had two Jewish employees who would not work on Saturday, nor would they handle (touch) Pork products. We were advised that we had to give them Saturday's off AND place them in jobs where they wouldn't have to touch pork products (which was essentially everyplace except for the production line usually we put them on cashier or drive up window duty.)
Only rarely have I observed a member ask for advice, support and input, receive it from someone on his side and then proceed to argue with that poster, citing recollections unrelated to the specific focus of the thread. But, OK. You win.
Since, by the time you get to NP education, you probably have been a patient (I certainly have, thoroughly, for 34 years), it hardly makes sense, if that was the only reason. I know what patients feel during an exam, having been on the receiving end many, many times.
It also sounds as though the classmate's wife was the one who got the empathy lesson.
Seems like there are plenty of teaching hospitals and public clinics where students are normally placed for clinical rotations. In fact, as a foster parent of teenaged girls, we used a public health clinic. They were well cared for by a NP, and her students occasionally did my girls' exams.
There was no shortage of patient's needing care, and most were happy to help students learn.
I was one of 6 students in the first graduating class for the post masters NP certificate at the school(Syracuse University). They had no clue what to do with us so we sort of made up our own cirriculum as we went along. :) The university no longer has a nursing program but I'm told that the very next yeat they did hire models.
Our class had a lab on assessments, done after the bed bath lab and checkoffs. For bed bathing, the girls mostly wore tank tops and shorts; a sports bra was an option, etc. We did not come near washing genitalia, or undressing each other, but we had to show that we knew something about it. For example, as I had my classmate on her side to pretend to wash her back, I had to state that it would be a good time to give her a back massage. And instead of washing her privates, I had to mimic an exchange: hand her the washcloth and state, "here you may wash your privates, remember to wipe front to back", and she had to refuse, and I had to show the instructor the position her legs should be in for me to wash her.
Same thing with bedpans that day. Our partners had to place us on a bedpan to show that they could do it safely. We were pretty lighthearted about it and joked around a lot.
The assessment thing was just a lab though, and after the bed bath thing I had no problem pulling up my shirt for a classmate to listen to my bowel sounds. However, there was a lot we left out in practice. We didn't undress, we did a lot of heart/lung sounds, no breast exams, nothing that required being undressed other than bowel sounds... we got to play with the otoscope and look in eyes/ears a lot too. In fact, I didn't touch anyone's breast with the intent of examining it, until two quarters later in the postpartum ward during O.B. clinicals.
The point of the bed bathing, I think, (other than learning how to do it) was to allow us to get comfortable with each other, and to perhaps glimpse that bathing a human being can be complex, there's a lot of safety and infection control things to think about. This should allow the student to see how it is possible to be both professional (a tad detached) and compassionate when handling another human being's body for something most people normally do for themselves.
At least in my opinion. In my Assessment class we are required to take our shirts off (the girls can wear sports bras) for the cardiac, respiratory, and abdominal assessments. When, I was young and in shape doing this would have merely made me uncomfortable. Now that I'm middleaged, obese, and generally disgusting it is down right humiliating. I don't take my shirt off even in front of my wife, and I never even look at myself in the mirror when I get out of the shower without a shirt on. You can argue that this is not logical and might even be pathological, but I would assert that it's also my right. These feelings are exasperated by the fact that most of the students I am forced to work with are female between the ages of 18 and 22. Many will say that this teaches empathy for what patients have to go through all the time. This may or may not be the case, but there is one crucial difference. Patients, generally have the right to refuse any assessment, treatment, or procedure without being punished. As students it can be argued that we have such a right, but the price is that we fail if it is exercised (it would be like a school asserting that they don't require students to say the Pledge so long as they don't mind receiving an "F"). Although, this is not the situation in my case, I know of one person who's religious beliefs prevent her from being exposed in front of others in this manner. Thus, in her case her religious freedoms were also being impinged upon.
If nothing else they should offer the opportunity to be excused from the exercise (at least in terms of being examined). If this meant finding a "replacement", I would gladly be willing to shell out several hundred dollars to avoid the humiliation if this is what it took to find someone willing to be assessed in my place (and when I was younger, and in shape would have probably done it for $20.00 despite being shy).
I wonder if anyone has ever brought successful legal challenges to schools based upon this sort of objection?
I am reading some of these posts and I am SOOOOOO glad we did not do this in my nursing school. I think that is a violation of a person's rights. Even if a patient does not want a bed bath....you can not force it. Roland.....I feel for you! I really don't think it is right! Are all nursing schools like this? For our bed bath and assessments, we were checked off on our patients. We practiced our assessments on each other, but we had our clothes on.
The point of the bed bathing, I think, (other than learning how to do it) was to allow us to get comfortable with each other, and to perhaps glimpse that bathing a human being can be complex, there's a lot of safety and infection control things to think about. This should allow the student to see how it is possible to be both professional (a tad detached) and compassionate when handling another human being's body for something most people normally do for themselves. --Indy
Very good points.
Reminds me of the first elderly lady I bathed. I didn't realize how tuned in I was to her comfort and sensitivity level until I got ready to undercover her torso and wash there. It was a little difficult to pick up that breast. Not because I was embarassed or thought she would be, but because I wanted her to feel OK, and not be agitated or anxious.
Funny thing. Turns out patients are expecting us to touch them when we take care of them. For the most part, my patients have been just fine with it, as long as I kept them covered, warm and (eventually) dry.
A few (usually little frail things with longish blue hair) have wondered how I can bear to work with people "that way." It's simple for me. I consider it an honor to be able to help another human being who cannot do this for themselves. I always thank my patients for allowing me to be a part of their care.
You'd be surprised what that does for both you and your patient.
I am in grad school now, and have been told by instructors that the advanced assessment students used to have to practice pelvic exams on one another. It's my opinion that forcing you to take on the patient role in this embarrassing kind of situations is WRONG, and were it still a practice today I would VEHEMENTLY object, and I would go to any extreme to stop that practice. Real patients have a choice, and just because you are a student shouldn't mean that your rights are violated. I believe I have a right to not let people see me partially or completely undressed, and that right shouldn't conflict with my ability to achieve a nursing education. I mean, I don't want to have to sit next to someone in class everyday and think to myself, "OMG, that guy has seen my cervix." I know I have said it before, but there is a reason that people don't party with their proctologists and gynocologists.
Roland, does your university publish a newspaper? What about writing a letter to the editor so that this practice can be made known to the general student population? You are an eloquent and persuasive writer, and I'll bet you could garnish much support from the student body. Maybe if the program administrators can see that this practice is found unacceptable to many other people, then something will change.
RNin05
4 Posts
I'm pretty surprised that you have to practice half naked as well....it wouldn't go over very well in my school. We practiced on dummies in our skill lab and got signed off there before doing it in the hospital. We were also able to practice on each other with OOB to the chair, wound care, bowel sounds, etc. but we never did anything more than roll up a sleeve or show a little belly, and it was a voluntary thing. Don't you have clinicals in a hospital setting? Aren't you supposed to assess a real patient with a real diagnosis? How will you ever know what a real S3 sounds like ro real crackles or wheezing? The tapes just aren't the same as real life...and I'm sure you won't hear it on your healthy classmates either.
I, personally, wouldn't be able to disrobe in front of most of the people who were in my first, and even second semester, clinicals...a lot of people failed or dropped out between then and now. I would have felt violated. I understand that the patient may feel that way as well, but they are a patient in a hospital...it is expected and we go to extremes to try to make the patient feel comfortable and that their privacy is respected. I understand the empathy standpoint, but most of us have been patients in a doctor's office or a hospital and have experienced the embarrassment of taking our clothes off for a physical...I don't need to be taught that in an early clinical course.
Maybe I'm being naive and I must admit, I'm a bit uninformed because it's not the norm where I live, but on first reading of this thread, I was kind of shocked that it is practiced so often at other schools. My mom went to Nursing school over 30 yrs ago and they used to practice injections on each other...I'm glad that the times have changed....
But, Roland, maybe if you ask the instructor if it can be a more private experience, maybe break you all up into groups of 3 or 4 and allow hospital gowns to be worn...I bet more people will like your idea and side with you, maybe you'll get to change the way things are done....GOOD LUCK!