Nursing student asks nurses the question..

Nurses General Nursing

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So as a third semester nursing student, myself and many of my fellow colleagues often wonder the same thing. Why is it that when we go to clinical, about 75% of the nurses act snobby and like it's some huge ordeal that we are there in "their space"? They were all nursing students at some point as well, students who wanted to learn skills and gain experience while at their clinicals. I often dread clinical due to feeling as I am in the way or that I am annoying a "seasoned" nurse. One would think, that as a nurse you'd want future nurses to gain as much experience and knowledge as they can while they're in school. So the point of this post, I would like to and I'm sure many other nursing students would like to know; why is it necessary to be rude and someone who doesn't want to help students learn or why is it necessary to not explain stuff to the student when they ask? I'm not trying to be conniving, I honestly just want to know, so that maybe I can understand.

P.S. I'm not saying this is true for ALL nurse's, as there are some that are amazing and share their knowledge and expertise.

Thank you.

How is it that I have a superiority complex as a student? I don't believe that I am better than anyone, just as I don't believe a nurse is any better than I am. I believe in equality. Also, I can't help that my instructor is unreliable and is a poor instructor. I don't expect the nurses to owe me anything, I would just appreciate if I weren't looked at as a burden when I stick to myself mostly or when I ask a question about something that I've been taught is concerning.

I got the same vibe from you. Several of your previous posts present that type of attitude. Such as, "Or when I assess the patient and find a S3 gallop and tell my nurse and she just looks at me like I'm insane and does nothing about it, even though it's never been charted on. Like I understand you have a job to do, but if I tell you I found something abnormal or ask a simple question, it should be recognized at least." and "So, for me to share with the nurse that I auscultated an S3, should have grabbed her attention to listen to the patient again so that appropriate interventions could have been in place"

You are a student. I'm all for learning, but your assessments of patients are not the whole picture. The nurses have more knowledge and experience, and you're acting like your assessments should be gold to them, when it's really their judgement call.

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.
I don't believe that I am better than anyone, just as I don't believe a nurse is any better than I am. I believe in equality. Also, I can't help that my instructor is unreliable and is a poor instructor.

You are equal in worth as a person, but NOT in knowledge. You're learning. Be humble.

I trust that you will be completely honest in your end-of-semester feedback of the instructor? It's not the floor nurse's fault either, and shouldn't be expected to take on her job, simply because she doesn't do it.

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Specializes in Oncology, Rehab, Public Health, Med Surg.
I'm not questioning the nurse in front of the patient, just simply sharing what I have found and know to be abnormalities. S3 if new and not previously diagnosed may indicate ventricular dysfunction caused by fluid volume excess, renal insufficiency, valvular regurgitation, etc. So, for me to share with the nurse that I auscultated an S3, should have grabbed her attention to listen to the patient again so that appropriate interventions could have been in place. This patient also had +2 bilateral edema.

"Should have grabbed her attention". You truly think that you know better than this pt's nurse where her attention should be? If you know all this as a *** student***, why even bother to ask questions? Surely, with all your book experience, you already know the answer

I dont blame her. I would not have engaged either

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As many others have said, it's extra work to have nursing students. Sometimes our workload is so heavy we're so thinly stretched we feel like we're barely keeping our heads above water as is. Throw a couple of students into that mix... and we might start to feel like we're drowning.

Students can't help but be a bit slower in terms of assessing, giving meds, and providing care. It's expected that you will have to look up more things and ask more questions than an experienced nurse who has worked on the unit for awhile. These are things that you should be doing to safely practice. But understand that these things alter our capacity to time manage our patient loads as we would normally because we're working collaboratively to care for our shared patient(s).

We still have to assess our patients in order to check that you didn't miss anything in your assessments. You don't know what you don't know and sometimes you miss something important because you didn't ask the right question or know what to look for. Again, that's part of learning and it's something we anticipate. We still have to check your charting and possibly add in our own findings/interventions. We have to follow-up with you to ensure that you are doing the appropriate interventions at the appropriate times and communicating pertinent findings to us so that, together, we can communicate with applicable team members (because an important part of your learning is working with the rest of the health care team). And throughout all of this, we answer your questions so that, hopefully, we help to further your understanding of the patient and give you a better sense of the big picture in terms of their care.

I honestly love having nursing students but it's not easy! So try not to judge us too harshly. We are doing the best we can. And so long as we are not practicing unsafely, try to keep in mind there is no such thing as the perfect nurse. We are human and can get stressed. Keep asking your questions- it's an integral part of your learning. But don't take it too personally if once in awhile your nurse doesn't answer them. There's probably an underlying reason you are not aware of.

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Specializes in Geriatrics, Dialysis.
How is it that I have a superiority complex as a student? I don't believe that I am better than anyone, just as I don't believe a nurse is any better than I am. I believe in equality. Also, I can't help that my instructor is unreliable and is a poor instructor. I don't expect the nurses to owe me anything, I would just appreciate if I weren't looked at as a burden when I stick to myself mostly or when I ask a question about something that I've been taught is concerning.

Therein lies the problem. You are right, it is not your fault at all that your instructor is unreliable. It is also not the floor nurses responsibility to take up that slack. So yes, when you need to bring questions or concerns to the nurse instead of to your instructor you are a burden. Not your fault, but it is the the truth.

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Without reading all the responses, I'll just give my two cents worth: Some schools expect staff nurses to function as UNPAID FACULTY. Now, how is that even remotely fair? They are charging you tuition, and expecting staff nurses to essentially work FOR THEM...FOR FREE...

Secondly, no matter how nice or helpful the student is, they are NOT helpful to the nurse. They are extra work. Plain and simple.

The final thing: pretty much every time this subject comes up, the relatively new nurses say "OMG, now I GET IT. I didn't before, but I sure do now, and I'm so embarrassed how I acted."

Does that tell you anything?

Many of us have not forgotten what it's like to be a student, but here's the thing: when we were in school, it was our clinical instructor's job to teach us, NOT the staff nurses. Absolutely, 100% the responsibility of the PAID instructor to actually, you know, "instruct." This new thing of CIs just unloading a bunch of students onto the floor and running off is really unacceptable, and not fair to the students who are paying tuition to a university to be taught by competent, vetted, university faculty. You students should be complaining loudly to the institution that is taking your money and assigning too many of you to one instructor, NOT complaining about nurses who have absolutely no affiliation whatsoever to your school not wanting to work for free for that institution.

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Specializes in ICU/ Trauma/ Med-Surg.
Without reading all the responses, I'll just give my two cents worth: Some schools expect staff nurses to function as UNPAID FACULTY. Now, how is that even remotely fair? They are charging you tuition, and expecting staff nurses to essentially work FOR THEM...FOR FREE...

Secondly, no matter how nice or helpful the student is, they are NOT helpful to the nurse. They are extra work. Plain and simple.

The final thing: pretty much every time this subject comes up, the relatively new nurses say "OMG, now I GET IT. I didn't before, but I sure do now, and I'm so embarrassed how I acted."

Does that tell you anything?

Many of us have not forgotten what it's like to be a student, but here's the thing: when we were in school, it was our clinical instructor's job to teach us, NOT the staff nurses. Absolutely, 100% the responsibility of the PAID instructor to actually, you know, "instruct." This new thing of CIs just unloading a bunch of students onto the floor and running off is really unacceptable, and not fair to the students who are paying tuition to a university to be taught by competent, vetted, university faculty. You students should be complaining loudly to the institution that is taking your money and assigning too many of you to one instructor, NOT complaining about nurses who have absolutely no affiliation whatsoever to your school not wanting to work for free for that institution.

Thanks for the response. I appreciate your honesty as well as everyone else's. I have realized that I shouldn't be quick to blame the nurse, and as many of you have stated it's the instructor's responsibility. My clinical group met before class today and decided to inform our lead clinical instructor who is over all the clinical groups at my university of our concerns and experience with this particular instructor. She will be making a surprise visit soon to see firsthand what we experience weekly from this instructor.

I apologize if I have came off to be a arrogant or to have a superiority complex. That was not my intention when I posted, I was just looking for feedback which I've gotten. I've received helpful feedback and then some not so helpful feedback. I appreciate everyone's time for reading and responding to my post.

Respectfully,

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Specializes in ICU/ Trauma/ Med-Surg.
"Should have grabbed her attention". You truly think that you know better than this pt's nurse where her attention should be? If you know all this as a *** student***, why even bother to ask questions? Surely, with all your book experience, you already know the answer

I dont blame her. I would not have engaged either

Is it necessary to be so scathing? And to answer your question "You truly think that you know better than this pt's nurse where her attention should be?", no I don't. But to assume I'm not looking at the whole picture and to think I'm only worried about that one finding is inaccurate. I looked at the "whole picture" and talked about it with my peers before I even told the nurse. So please, continue to belittle me for my "book experience", since that's the only experience I have after all, and because you know my experience.

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I like having students but in my current position I don't want a student. I'm a float nurse and I usually don't know anything about the floor that I'm assigned too. Heck I sometimes have to go on a treasure hunt to find the pantry let alone explain things to a student. And because I'm a float nurse I usually have a heavy assignment. I flat out refuse to have a student with me even though at times I'm the most experienced nurse on the floor. When I had a home floor I was a preceptor and liked it but I did like a break from time to time.

It's not that we don't want to teach but sometimes having a student can send us over the edge because it's double work. The student asks a question in front of the patient and the nurse is using medical jargon and the patient is like wah??? Then you have to explain it all over again to the patient and it turns into a cycle between the student nurse and the patient and then you're late passing meds to the other 15 patients (exaggerating the patient load but still). Those type of questions are things the student nurse can look up and discuss in post clinical conference or ask the clinical instructor.

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I did not feel like reading through all the comments.

To answer your initial question - where I work students come a lot , they are a part of the floor for the day. And I am not talking about one or two students - more like a group. Some of them are form the LPN program, some from the RN program. I have not noticed that any RN are bothered, actually they seem happy to have students.

I enjoyed having a student, the clinical instructor would do certain things with the student like passing out meds or some dressing change and such but they were also doing tasks without the instructor that are appropriate.

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Specializes in ICU, trauma.

Being a new grad i definitely see both sides of the story. I sometimes felt not necessarily that nurses on the floor were mean to me, but at times could be unfriendly even flat out rude to me.

Nursing student horror story:

When i was a sophomore i was on a OB unit with other students and a instructor. I was warned about this particular nurse and her unfriendliness at the beginning... Sometimes when it's that "time of the month" i get horribly sick But I stuck it out and stayed the whole time. I had finished off all patient cares and was trying to report off to my primary nurse. I would literally start talk to her "Hey so-and-so, can i give you report?" and she would ignore me and go back to talking to other nurses. At this point i was SUPER pale and i thought i was going to vomit due to abd cramping. She saw i was super ill, and that i kept going to the bathroom while i was waiting for her, but still treated me like that. My clinical instructor informed the nurse manager about it, because i was honestly horrible to the point that my peers and her could see she was ignoring my very obvious attempts to talk with her.

ANWAYS, sorry for the TLDR! But nurses are people and they all have different personalities. Some can be so great on their good days, but they can have bad days when they are just in a bad mood. Not all want to be teacher, and are very introverted. So i wouldn't say 75% of nurses are snobby, when you just have a bad apple out of the bunch.

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Specializes in critical care.
:wideyed:

Wow. WOW. When I was in school, I had to go to the unit the night before and research my patient and was expected to know all about them, including their scheduled meds, by the time I arrived bright and early 1 hour before shift change. The *only* exception to this was L&D.

Interesting. Things sure have changed.

Not everywhere. We had to do that, too. Have hope!

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