Nursing and body piercings

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Do you believe hospital administration has the right to prohibit wearing tongue piercings or multiple ear piercings while on duty?

I'm all for tattooing and body piercing. It's a form of self expression and does not determine a person's character or worth. To think otherwise means that the person with the narrow-minded view is ignorant and possibly left thier mind somewhere in the Dark Ages.

However, any work environment is a place of professionalism. This means your tattoos are covered, your piercings are removed (yes, even a single discreet pair tiny studs or hoops), no rings on your fingers (this includes wedding bands - i never wore mine during clinicals when I took my UHC course), scents are not worn, and hair color is an appropriate shade.

Personal time is for personal expression and professional time is when you express your conservative persona. Personal expression in a place of professional capacity is a distraction to the self and others.

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By the way, one of my closest friends works as a veterinary assistant. She has an eyebrow ring, labray, tongue ring, 2 nipple piercings, and a clit piercing. She is one of the sweetest, warmest, intelligient people I have ever known. She is also generous and would give anyone the shirt off her back. I have never encountered another soul as wonderful and special as her. She also removes her piercings for work every day and shows up looking professional.

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Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.

It is not a mutiliation. For many people tattoos are spiritual and represent something important in their lives - the loss of a loved one or they get them to remember an important or marked event. That certainly doesnt qualify as mutilation. If anything it is truly symbolic of something meaningful that has happened in their lifetime.

I think aspiring to tattooing and piercing for a teenager is a lot safer than aspiring to do drugs, have sex and smoke...

Sorry but my beliefs say that to subject yourself to the risk of infection and complications (yes, some people check out their modifying artist's hygiene practices, but many do not), to make a unessential symbolic gesture, well, it tells me something about the person. Much like bragging about material possessions, etc. I like the way G-d makes people and they are beautiful enough, the way they are.

I generally prefer hanging with people that do not find such gestures necessary to express themselves. They express their diverse personalities so openly, they don't need "modification".

If people care to do this, well, that's cool for them. But jewelry, perfume, long nails do not belong in a professional health care environment. On anyone.

I personally raised a teenager that did not aspire to drugs, sex or smoking...and did not get tattoos or piercings. She didn't need to do either.

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Sorry but my beliefs say that to subject yourself to the risk of infection and complications (yes, some people check out their modifying artist's hygiene practices, but many do not), to make a unessential symbolic gesture, well, it tells me something about the person. Much like bragging about material possessions, etc. I like the way G-d makes people and they are beautiful enough, the way they are.

I generally prefer hanging with people that do not find such gestures necessary to express themselves. They express their diverse personalities so openly, they don't need "modification".

If people care to do this, well, that's cool for them. But jewelry, perfume, long nails do not belong in a professional health care environment. On anyone.

I personally raised a teenager that did not aspire to drugs, sex or smoking...and did not get tattoos or piercings. She didn't need to do either.

Well, I think that circumcising a child (which is often done for spiritual reasons) exposes them to risks of infection and complication at an EXTREMELY young age and these days is not done for cleanliness but really only as a matter of a persons belief systems

(and no, I do not believe piercing a babys ears is appropriate)

Although I personally do not believe in God, I do believe there is a higher power of some sort and for those who do believe in God I think that God would accept people however they choose to be - pierced, tattooed, branded, and modified however they wish - because that is how they feel that they should be and if God didnt put them on this earth that way then they can make themselves that way - and I doubt there is any problem with it up in heaven...

And of course your teenager didnt aspire to those things - you dont, and you taught your child not to, that it was wrong to...that people that "aspire" to being pierced and tattooed probable are looked down upon in society...

And don't go saying NO - you said it yourself that piercings and tattoos "tell me something about the person"

you are judging people by their cover - not by who they really are...

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Well, I think that circumcising a child (which is often done for spiritual reasons) exposes them to risks of infection and complication at an EXTREMELY young age and these days is not done for cleanliness but really only as a matter of a persons belief systems

(and no, I do not believe piercing a babys ears is appropriate)

Although I personally do not believe in God, I do believe there is a higher power of some sort and for those who do believe in God I think that God would accept people however they choose to be - pierced, tattooed, branded, and modified however they wish - because that is how they feel that they should be and if God didnt put them on this earth that way then they can make themselves that way - and I doubt there is any problem with it up in heaven...

And of course your teenager didnt aspire to those things - you dont, and you taught your child not to, that it was wrong to...that people that "aspire" to being pierced and tattooed probable are looked down upon in society...

And don't go saying NO - you said it yourself that piercings and tattoos "tell me something about the person"

you are judging people by their cover - not by who they really are...

Well, well...you don't believe in God, but you define what is God-like, insofar as tolerance for folks who are obsessed with self mutilation. I believe in God...a God of my understanding, and if my God wanted us to be tatood, pierced, or otherwise, he/she would have had me born with tats, genital piercings, human femurs through my nose, the works. When you come around to believing, than speak for what God would accept. In the mean time, you are p***ing me off :angryfire

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I think everyone who has posted on this BB has demonstrated the most wonderful thing about this world, difference & uniqueness (is that a word?).

Can't we all just get along,, pierced, tattooed, or not?! :kiss

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Vet - I believe in the Christian God, and I myself have several tattoos and would like to have piercings (but don't due to the stigma surrounding them that some people here have so obviously shown to be present). The God I believe in doesn't judge me by a rough exterior (the color of my skin, my gender, whether are not I'm pierced, etc) but by the heart. It's not mutilation as far as I'm concerned, but more like self expression. :)

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ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.....blink........blink....hey, has anyone thrown out the trash :p

The only enemy a nurse has is another enema!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Specializes in Anesthesia.
I stick by my beliefs...it's low class trash...perhaps WE ALL need some cross cultural training; some of us come from cultures that abhor this practice, and I am one of them. In my world, the only people who mark their bodies with such garbage are sociopathic thugs...so from my socio-eco-cultural-ethnic class, no one would consider defiling one's body as a matter of "expression"; I may appreciate the right to trash one's body...in fact, I would defend that right...but I don't have to like it, and I don't; it says a lot about a person, and none of what I see or hear is good. :stone

Alnamvet,

I must say that I resent the implication that a piercing, tongues in particular, make a person "low rent." I had my nose pierced about 14 years ago. I pierced my tongue about 10 or 12 years ago now, before it was a real popular thing to do. Why did I pierce it? Well, I can tell you that it had nothing to do with the reason to which you elude. My tongue piercing, like my 20 something other piercings and several tattoos were obtained because I admire this form of artistry. I really don't care if you like it, or my neighbor does, or even if my husband does (which he doesn't, but he is open-minded enough to allow me self expression without refering to me as low rent). I enjoy my piercings and tattoos, and guess what: I am NOT low rent; I am not lacking in intellect nor am I a sociopath; I am not unprofessional. I do not wear my piercings at work, and my tattoos are located in covert areas. Why? It's not because I feel it is inappropriate or unprofessional, but because I personally hope to place patients at ease during their hospital stay even if it imposes on my freedom of personal expression. I don't feel like it's something I have to do to be professional, but rather that it is something I choose to do for my own reasons.

What I consider to be low-rent is a frame of mind that makes some people think that they are better than other people because their tastes don't include the same likes or dislikes.

Well, well...you don't believe in God, but you define what is God-like, insofar as tolerance for folks who are obsessed with self mutilation. I believe in God...a God of my understanding, and if my God wanted us to be tatood, pierced, or otherwise, he/she would have had me born with tats, genital piercings, human femurs through my nose, the works. When you come around to believing, than speak for what God would accept. In the mean time, you are p***ing me off :angryfire

I am a Christian Alnamvet, and let me remind you of one of my favorite Bible verses: All fall short of the glory of God. Notice how it doesn't say those with tattoos and body piercings fall short of the glory of God, but the rest of you are okay. Your argument is flawed. If I were to accept your argument that basically says people are born exactly the way that God wants them to be and should not be altered, I would have to accept that people born with congenital defects of the heart, for instance, should just have to live that way (for as long as their malfunctioning organ would allow them to live) instead of having corrective therapy because that is the way God created them. Or is it different because we are talking about body modifications made for aesthetic reasons rather than medical reasons?

Be blessed brother.

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Can we not turn this into a thing about faith we all have different faiths none better than the other please keep to topic.

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Specializes in ER, ICU, Hyperbarics/Wound Care, Psych.

I wish someone would tell the artist that does my tattoos that I am low rent, because my last one was 300.00. If he knew how trashy I was he might give me a break on the price. I personally think opinions are like anal apertures, everyone has one, most of them are odoriferous.

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