Nurses' image set back 100 years

Everyone is going to block colors, because they can! It's an employer's market and color coding is more recognizeable to the patient. HOWEVER, I will say your bargaining unit should then push for everyone else to be out of scrubs!

They tried this in our hospital and no one wanted white. RN's wear navy blue-everyone else who wore scrubs that were not healthcare personnel were placed in old fashioned uniforms. Transport, housekeeping and others.

Our RT teal, OR traditional green, and our techs in Dark Green. NO ONE else is allowed scrubs.....it has helped tremendously identifying the nursing staff. I just hate the blue, but it is far better than white!!!!

Keep up the fight....just imagine all the perimenopausal RN's who can't get to the bathroom now and have their periods!!!! Just a beautiful sight in store......personally I think white should be banned....everything shows.

M

We won't agree to white. Block colors are okay, but not white. And we'll also not agree that the RN colors are worn by the NA's and techs. Seems like they could figure that one out.....if they want the nurses to be identifiable, then only nurses in the nurse color! And I will make my own, as I always do. I like a good fit, and have a skin sensitivity to the crappy thread used on mass-produced scrubs. Maybe we should also insist on Made in America Scrubs for the ones they provide.

I just returned from a meeting where our bargaining unit and some in the administration discussed color coding of nursing departments.

While I have no hard objection to the coding system, I do think it will result in people not actually looking at name tags over time, but our hospital has decided to set the nursing image back by 100 years by mandating nurses in all but two units wear white! I'm not kidding.

They cited a 700 pt. survey (whoop de doo) from a place in the East part of the US that proved that patients think nurses wearing white are more professional. If that were a drug study of 700, we'd all scoff at it! And that's what I am doing to this one.

The "appearance" of a nurse doesn't make them a good nurse, so I asked why we are trying to "trick" patients into thinking we're more professional by what we wear. Either you've got a good nurse, or you don't, and what they are wearing has nothing to do with it.

If the nurse I have is wearing pink camo scrubs, AND knows what he/she is doing, I am FINE with that.

Again, I am so glad I am close to hanging this up.

We offered a number of objections, and in the end, they'll have people quit over it and certainly it would be difficult to recruit......and we'll have coding, but it won't be white. Still, they had the deer in the headlights look at our objections over yet another "evidence-based" study. Puh-leeze!

People will quit a job over having to wear all-white? Sounds kind of extreme to me. I HATE the all-white look (it was what we had to wear for school), but if my employer said (as did my school) that that was the dress code, I'd suck it up and pray for menopause....

We won't agree to white. Block colors are okay, but not white. And we'll also not agree that the RN colors are worn by the NA's and techs. Seems like they could figure that one out.....if they want the nurses to be identifiable, then only nurses in the nurse color! And I will make my own, as I always do. I like a good fit, and have a skin sensitivity to the crappy thread used on mass-produced scrubs. Maybe we should also insist on Made in America Scrubs for the ones they provide.

YES!..

We won't agree to white. Block colors are okay, but not white. And we'll also not agree that the RN colors are worn by the NA's and techs. Seems like they could figure that one out.....if they want the nurses to be identifiable, then only nurses in the nurse color! And I will make my own, as I always do. I like a good fit, and have a skin sensitivity to the crappy thread used on mass-produced scrubs. Maybe we should also insist on Made in America Scrubs for the ones they provide.

YES!..

People will quit a job over having to wear all-white? Sounds kind of extreme to me. I HATE the all-white look (it was what we had to wear for school), but if my employer said (as did my school) that that was the dress code, I'd suck it up and pray for menopause....

Yes, I would, because there are other hospitals in my area, where white wouldn't be required. But I would just quit because I can, and I'm ready to retire soon anyway. I don't see it as a plus for recruiting.

It's yet another smokescreen to give the "perception" that one is getting better care. I have an issue with that.

For some reason when I responded to your post I had it in mind that you were a newer nurse -- I am sorry for sounding as if I was talking down to you if I did!! You probably have the best lookin' scrubs in the whole place if you make them yourself. I sew too so I can really appreciate a garment made with quality, that not even the expensive mass-produced scrubs have.

Well, thanks! I do enjoy my own scrubs, and my patients never fail to comment on them, as well. If I wanted no free time whatsoever, I could probably start sewing scrubs for all my friends, and they'd all have some that actually fit!

I will be making my own again, in my unit's assigned color (burgundy) with buttons placed for proper closure and coverage, pockets that are at my hands' level and that are big enough to actually hold what I need to haul around, and long enough so that when I do have to stoop or bend, I'm not emulating the plumber!

The uniform I wore for my nursing graduation was awesome. It was quite tailored, fit oh so perfectly! That was long ago and far away.