As someone who is about to complete medical school, and who went through nursing school for a BSN, the knowledge gap between the two is exponential. In light of recent arguments made by militant nurses who argue that the required nursing courses to complete an associates degree or BSN is just as good as medical school. First you take an A&P, 101 course on microbiology, a introductory 12 week course in "orgo/gen chem, Biochem" all combined superficially in 12 weeks, 12 week course in Pathophysiology 101.
Looking back those courses, they were very superficial at the amount of knowledge required to pass. Those science courses were no where near the complexity that medical schools dig into, where things get broken down into the mechanism of protein structures that allow them to function a certain way. With out understanding the complexities of the inner workings of what actually occur at the cellular level, you can't begin to understand what went wrong when the ALGORITHM they are trained to follow doesn't go according to plan. Then comes the nursing courses, and the "clinicals" that they do. The actual nursing courses were good enough to understand and complete NURSING tasks. They were not good enough to treat and effectively manage complex disease, but when I was a nursing student at that time I thought I knew just as much as a doctor, and I was dead wrong. The clinicals were a joke, you passed out meds,maybe gave a few injections, changed wet diapers on incontinent patients, and followed the orders given by the doctor.
I am all about advanced education, but there is NO DIFFERENCE in the fundamental knowledge between a RN VS BSN other than some "nursing research courses and fluff to get fancy titles like clinical nurse specialist, or infection control specialist" but the core principles are EXACTLY THE SAME. So when they claim they have a BSN not an associates in nursing, there is NO difference, and I dare you to find me a BSN who would say there is.
Something else that ticks me off I hear from nurses trying to be MD's is " I have 15+ years in the ICU, ER, or MED/SURG floor," that counts as more education like a residency. Good for you! But, when I worked as a nurses assistant for 5+ years I didn't claim to know or be equivalent to a RN just because I saw what they did, and helped them carry out orders. How would NURSES like it if LPN's claimed to be EQUIVALENT to RN's/BSN's? Probably wouldn't go well. I am not knocking down the profession of nursing, what I am annoyed with is NURSES/NP's claiming to be equivalent to MD's. You are not, you were trained in the NURSING SCOPE of practice.
I love nurses, yes I would trust a seasoned ICU nurse's opinion vs a Freshly minted MD out of med school in July as an Intern, but I guarantee that by the end of 3-4 months of intern year, his knowledge base will increase exponentially to surpass that of any ICU nurse due to his knowledge base gained from 8 years of education that doesn't stop during residency, and now applying it daily as a intern. So nurses I beg you to please just work within your scope as a nurse, and stop trying to claim equivalency through studies "propaganda" funded by the militant nurses association.
I have some derivative of Hyperthymesia‎ (like Marilu Henner) where I [basically] remember [almost] everything, but can't always recall when needed...
Anyway, I believe that it was on this forum (AN) that a NP talked about the requirements saying that he/she trained/"interned" with [physician] interns for the curriculum that applied to NPs. The topic (I believe) was someone asking about NP vs. PA.
I don't have time to try and look up the exact topic, perhaps someone else may remember.
That is the closest thing that I can remember about comparing nursing training to physician training.
But that isn't even close to what the OP said. The OP was very clear that he was talking about BSN/ADN trained nurses claiming that their training is equivalent to medical training. And seriously, I wasn't really looking for the links. I know how to use the search feature. I was calling him out on his ridiculous allegation.
I also drive to services on Shabbos! AND turn on the lights! no one has ever accused me of being Orthodox, LOL...however I absolutely positively never turn on my cell phone while in synagogue. :)and now it's getting quite late and I'm going to be half asleep tomorrow morning...and my Hebrew is sketchy even when I'm fully rested :)
ixchel
4,547 Posts
Oh, of course! Monty Python is where I have learned the art of the successful conversation hijacking.
See below.