So recently the Chief Nursing Executive as my hospital decided that all nursing staff are required to wear hospital provided lab coats while on duty, along with the ID badge, no exception. To the tune of thousands of dollars, I might add...
The rationale being that nurses as professionals should be easily identifiable to patients and other staff. Although a few didn't warm up to this idea initially after some grumbling and groaning it appears to be a rousing success.
So one particularly snotty nursing student who no nurse wished to be saddled with d/t her pompous attitude, strolled onto the unit wearing... a lab coat (the kind found at a medical supply store).
The NM took one look at her and said, "You are not staff, you are not a professional, go remove the lab coat and then you may return to the unit."
The snotty little thing went crying to her clinical instructor whining that she had been "discriminated" against causing a frenzy of bad vibes that has now caused a rift between an already fragile dynamic between staff and students, all because of one bad egg.
So was the student in her right to attempt to blend in or did she cross the point of no return?
We're supposed to have lab coats in our program. Am I snotty for having one?
That's different. Seems in this instance it wasn't standard practice to wear a lab coat in the hospital setting for a student. Had a lab coat when I was a student over 18 years ago-we only could wear it when we had street clothes on, in a non-hospital setting. There was also a HUGE patch on our shoulders (lab coat and uniform)that identified us as students.
I know they are for ours. We don't have to wear them, but they are part of what we're allowed to wear during clinicals (we are required to have 3/4 length white lab coats).
Were the students specifically told not to wear lab coats
This is what I was thinking as well. I start NS in Jan. and we have to wear our lab coats the night before clinicals when meeting our patient. We have to wear dress pants, a nice top and then our coat and then proceed to the floor and meet the patient.
This is what I was thinking as well. I start NS in Jan. and we have to wear our lab coats the night before clinicals when meeting our patient. We have to wear dress pants, a nice top and then our coat and then proceed to the floor and meet the patient.
When I was a student, a lab coat was required specifically for this reason. We didn't have to wear it during the clinical experience itself; our royal blue scrubs that made us look like smurfs literally SCREAMED "nursing student". The lab coat we had was white and our school name was embroidered in bright candy-apple red. We wore that the evening before clinicals over nice street clothes to get the info and meet the patient. Any deviation from the student uniform meant we were out of uniform and could not participate in clinical experiences that day. A couple of those and you were out of the program. The school really took the uniform issue seriously.
We gripe eeryday about doctors and their pomposity and all, when the truth of the matter is that everyone wants a heriarchy, a ranking to set them above the rest.
This is exactly what happened.And the excuse of someone asking the student a question she might not know is just that, an excuse. Surely the student is not dumb( with being snotty:p) that he wouldn't direct the question to the right place.
You women are a bunch of HENS! Clucking over a "snotty" student? Clucking over her attire? Ladies, it's no wonder you can't get along! REALLY, don't you have something better on which to focus? Perhaps the PATIENTS!
Honestly...anyone can buy scrubs and a lab coat come into a hospital and pretend to be a nurse. The way you wrote what the nurse manager said sound snotty, rude and condescending. In general nurses are uppity...(sorry dont get mad not all nurses but the ones i come across) when i was in school most of the nurses were rude. No matter how nice i tried to be most of the always seemed annoyed when the students asked them anything, it was like we came there to take away there jobs.If that yound lady was acting snotty from the start probably she was praticing for when she really becomes a nurse or maybe she was emulating the NM.
It sounds as if the student was NOT aware of the new dress code; if this was the case and the students had not been warned not to wear jackets, then the NM was horribly rude. In any case, this should have been handled privately with the student. Honestly, it sounds like your NM failed to communicate expectations, then became angry when a student didn't follow the new unwritten rules.
That's along the lines of what I was thinking. How were the rules about the lab coats conveyed to the students and their CI: were they specifically told the labcoats were only for staff to wear and that they weren't to wear one? Or were they just told that nurses were going to start wearing lab coats, leaving the students and their CI to wonder if they should wear them too.
The NM should have made that point clear to them...and if it wasn't made clear, the CI should have taken the initiative to clarify the dress code. Unless something in the original story has been left out by the OP, I'm not putting all the blame on the student.
Back to the subject. I'll start off by saying that maybe this particular school doesn't have specific rules about lab coats, although, I find that hard to believe. Usually the hospital sets the rules for lab coats, and the school follows the hospitals rules very strictly. Even if this was a new rule for nurses to wear specific lab coats and the hospital had not addressed it with the school yet, the student reacted VERY VERY poorly. In fact, her reaction was beyond unprofessional and I am completely surprised the instructor didn't ream her out for coming to her in that fashion and acting the way she did. In fact, if a student acted that way in our program the clinical instructor would probably fail her.
How you act as a student reflects how you'll act as a nurse. Its apparent she acts completely unprofessionally. Appearing confident for critical thinking is completely different than being a know it all PITA. She's also a bit confused on the definition of discrimination. If other nursing students were wearing lab coats and the NM picked her specifically to remove it, then THAT is discrimination. I'm sure the NM would have reacted the same way to any other student wearing a lab coat. Students are NOT nurses. There's nothing discriminating about that. And how does she expect a NM will react to her doing something unprofessional when she is a nurse?? Does she think it'll be all flowers and cupcakes?? Is she going to run to the DON crying that the NM was mean to her??? I would have been sooooo embarassed by my error I would have apologized up and down, removed the lab coat and probably sent the NM a card to apologize as well and bought the whole floor cupcakes or something. OMG I would have wanted to crawl into a hole. (I am still a student obviously).
In my program we have specific lab coats to wear and they must have our school patch sewn on. No one wears them though. If its a chilly morning we wear a white shirt underneath our uniform and end up taking them off because we are running around like maniacs sweating to death after we get started on the floor.
I guess I am just really surprised that it caused more issues with the clinical instructor because in our program the instructors don't behave that way. Hospital priviledges are NOT A RIGHT... the hospital can ask certain students not to return, or take away the entire schools priviledge to return, so pulling something like this at a hospital site shocks me honestly.
You must be from the UK? We don't have Shaun here in the states that I am aware of! We have Timmy Time on the disney channel, but its the same maker and I LOVE that show. I was watching Shaun clips online and its much funnier for older people and I wish we had it here! I'll have to get the DVD! Timmy Time is about a preschool for the farm animals, and Timmy is the baby sheep. Its really cute but definitely not as hysterical as Shaun!!
You must be from the UK? We don't have Shaun here in the states that I am aware of! We have Timmy Time on the disney channel, but its the same maker and I LOVE that show. I was watching Shaun clips online and its much funnier for older people and I wish we had it here! I'll have to get the DVD! Timmy Time is about a preschool for the farm animals, and Timmy is the baby sheep. Its really cute but definitely not as hysterical as Shaun!!
They're available here in the states. I have all of Shaun's DVD's. We discovered "The Wrong Trousers" back in the late 90's!:heartbeat
Otessa, BSN, RN
1,601 Posts
That's different. Seems in this instance it wasn't standard practice to wear a lab coat in the hospital setting for a student. Had a lab coat when I was a student over 18 years ago-we only could wear it when we had street clothes on, in a non-hospital setting. There was also a HUGE patch on our shoulders (lab coat and uniform)that identified us as students.