Nurses pictures on patients whiteboards???

[jibbs]

Hi, I was recently informed that I had to have my picture taken for a "new project" at our hospital. Nsg admin is gonna take all staff nurses pics and then put them up in the rooms of the patients that nurse is assigned to for the shift. I find that a little bit strange myself. We are a small community hospital (25 beds including ICU and OB) and everyone works 12 hr shifts, so it's not like we r continually changing assignments, staff, etc. Does anyone else have anything like this where they work? we also have the white boards with r name, title, doc, etc in every room.

[Tait, MSN, RN]

This thread makes me laugh. Not the idea of implementing the photos, but of the mass hysteria and paranoia. Keys face it, if you want anonymity, nursing is not the career for you. They know your name, can easily look up your license statues, thus finding out where you live (at least in my state). You (as well as anyone) can be googled. This is the world we live in.

The perceived benefit of it I'd what we should be looking at. When you walk into the room, the Pt can easily identify you as their nurse. Something that I believe is a huge problem. If I were a patient, I would want to know who my nurse is. And no, sadly we can't rely on every member of the healthcare team identifying themselves.

Thank you.

Sometimes I think we need to be reminded that we are not the center of the universe and everyone out there does not want to love/hurt/murder/maim/or marry us. Most of them just want to know who the heck their nurse is amongst a sea of scrubs and lab coats.

[michigansapphire]

On our unit, we were given business-card-sized magnets with our ID picture, name, and title. One goes on the doorframe outside each of our patient rooms, and one goes on the whiteboard in the nurses' station. Patients and families don't even notice them, but they are very helpful for staff to quickly find the appropriate nurse.

We write our first names on the small whiteboards in the patient rooms.