i'll probably get flamed to the moon and back for this but..

[elijahvegas]

does anyone else get tired of hearing (from other SNAs/hopefuls/vets) what we nurses are "suppose" to be like ?

i read through thread after thread of how if you're not "compassionate to the core" and "really into nursing" and all this other stuff, you won't do well in the program or as a nurse in general.

is it really that big of a deal that some use the profession as a fallback option, or as a way to get by while trying to pursue something they'd really wanna be doing, without having to work something that provides just above minimum wage to make ends meet ?

i often hear people being scolded because their "heart" isn't in nursing, and for taking a seat away from others who "really" want to be there. Are any of us less deserving because we went through the same prereqs as everyone else but were competitive enough to actually secure a seat ? Is this something i should apologize for ? Should we be barred from applying simply because we have different prospects for the horizon ? Say med school ? or a field outside of healthcare altogether ?

Is it wrong to consider this profession a job ? one in which i will do my best to do well as i would with any other endeavor ? I go in with an attitude to make sure all of my duties are done, everyone is accounted for, and everything is the way it should be from the time i arrive until the time i clock out. Does it make me a bad nurse that i don't cry with a patient when they're going through a hard time ? Please dont take this as an implication as me directing negative or rude comments towards the patient. I'm attentive, and consoling, but i'd rather not have my emotions tie me up in knots to the point where i start to make clinical errors, which in the end is truly the most important thing to me.

Don't mind me, just my Tuesday morning rant for the day. I'm curious to see who else feels like this. I know im the minority but i can't be the only one

[Dranger]

As it was explained before to you in the other discussion, you need A&P, pharmacology, microbiology, ethics, patient safety, psych, sociology, nursing clinicals etc. You can get by without these, unfortunately, as a Paramedic but not as an RN.

Annnnd most of those classes are fluff or watered down sciences.....Hell even the microbiology isn't the 300 level that Bio majors take. There is a huge discrepancy between hard sciences (for say a bio or chem degree) and pre-nursing science pre reqs. How would I know? I did both...

Nursing is a lot of fluff, period. I am okay with this fact but I am not going to go around and try to pass off the notion that nursing school was oh so difficult. Was it time consuming? Yes. Difficult? No.

I went to a BSN program that is in the top 20 of US News Report too....

[smartnurse1982]

Someone please tell me where is the money?

Please!

[Geslina, BSN, RN]

I am a nice person in general, with excellent people skills. I can do any type of job that is people oriented. When choosing a career, money was a big part of it. I live in a pricy area, and nurses make good money. I also like the ability to switch jobs and areas of nursing if I get bored with wherever I am..but I admit, if nurses did not command a good salary, I would not be one.

[Dranger]

I am a nice person in general, with excellent people skills. I can do any type of job that is people oriented. When choosing a career, money was a big part of it. I live in a pricy area, and nurses make good money. I also like the ability to switch jobs and areas of nursing if I get bored with wherever I am..but I admit, if nurses did not command a good salary, I would not be one.

I don't think you are even close to being alone on that one.

[applesxoranges, BSN, RN]

To be honest, I think people need to have a healthy middle ground. When people are one extreme or another, it seems like they get burnt out. There needs to be a healthy loving to work with people and the necessary of this is my job mix.

[Julius Seizure]

but im looked at as less of a nurse because id rather push meds and titrate drips than to make a bed ?

You sound like me. So maybe you should be an ER nurse. Or ICU? It takes all kinds....there is a place for you in nursing! lots of places, in fact!

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

Jan 15 by jonnyvirgo

haven't been ignoring anyone just been busy ^^ i didnt expect this post to get so explosive lol

Yes you did....look at the title of your thread....i'll probably get flamed to the moon and back for this but..

I have mixed opinions. I think you need to WANT to be a nurse. Is that a calling....well maybe. Of course when I went to be a nurse...there was no "money" motivation as we were paid poorly...but we had a steady job. To say your are in nursing for the money because we get paid well is ok, however, I feel that you still need to LIKE what you are doing.

I see a common thread with the distaste of "all the fluff" and it is going to be a sexist comment...I notice that some males (and some younger nurses) are the ones most dissatisfied and talk about being in it for the money and have a distinct distaste of all the "fluff" and fuzzy stuff. I think that those who are in it only for the money can do a good job if they have a good work ethic...but as a supervisor and a patient, I can tell the difference between those that wait for the paycheck and those who REALLY LOVE what they do.

There are those who choose nursing as a second career because they WANT to be a nurse and those who choose nursing because they failed at something else or just couldn't find a job with their degree of choice....and I am sorry to say, for the most part, it shows at the bedside. While some can be technically competent and have patients like them is OK for some people.... it isn't my cup of tea.

As a life long critical care/emergency nurse I love the adrenaline just as much as the next guy....but I love making the bed neat and clean and making my patient comfortable. I shave my patients, fluff their pillow, brush their teeth....it makes them and me feel better. I take pride in the little things that I feel makes me a good nurse. But I can also forearm someone, stand down a gang member and take them down, place them in 4 point restraints, with just as much ease. But I LOVE what I do...I always have.

I don't think that because I love the fluff and I believe that to be a "good" nurse you have to like what you do....and like patients... that I lack the intelligence nor the wear with all to know how to calculate a drip, make split second decisions, and be a learned professional and an expert in my specialty. I don't view compassion nor empathy as a weakness. I don't sob at the bedside making me emotionally incapable to work...but I do feel sadness and at times have sought the solace of the restroom to shed a few tears. It doesn't make me any less of a professional or less of an expert in my field.

I bothers me when nurses have such disdain for the profession and state that the education is inferior somehow and watered down. That the tasks are menial and are not befitting a "profession". While I believe that there are serious flaws in the current curriculum in SOME programs and the education for the bedside nurse is being watered down to purposely favor "advanced degrees"....My micro/organic chemistry/gross anatomy were taken right along side of the med students....and we NOT watered versions of the real thing in my ASN program 35 years ago.

While I LOVE being a nurse....it doesn't mean that I don't think that some patients are jerks. Just because I love being a nurse doesn't mean I have to LOVE every patient...some people are just jerks. I think those who flame out had unrealistic expectations to begin with and the harsh reality of what nursing really is becomes too much to deal with. Have there been times I ahve hated a particular day? Sure. But I find solace in the little things that I can do to make my patients cared for...important. They make me feel good.

Nursing goes through this every few years...when the economy improves I believe that there will be another mass exodus of nurses. Those who stopped being at home Moms will return home. Those who went into nursing for the "pay" will bail at the first opportunity for pay away from nursing. All the new grads that can't find work will have moved on. Leaving another gaping hole. I have seen this a few times in nursing and will see it again.....and even thought nursing has tossed me aside because I am ill.

It is still the best job I ever had.

[LadyFree28, BSN, LPN, RN]

Well SAID, Esme.

[PMFB-RN, RN]

As a life long critical care/emergency nurse I love the adrenaline just as much as the next guy....but I love making the bed neat and clean and making my patient comfortable. I shave my patients, fluff their pillow, brush their teeth....it makes them and me feel better. I take pride in the little things that I feel makes me a good nurse. But I can also forearm someone, stand down a gang member and take them down, place them in 4 point restraints, with just as much ease. But I LOVE what I do...I always have.

Esme12 I wish you would come and work with me on our RRT team. You would be a perfect fit and we would have a BLAST!

I bothers me when nurses have such disdain for the profession and state that the education is inferior somehow and watered down.

I am afraid I fall into that camp. Judging by the new grads, from all kinds of programs, we have been getting in the last 5-7 years nursing education IS being watered down. It so annoying to me when I am expected to teach such poorly prepared grads. Instead of focusing on what they should be learning we first have to learn the cranial nerves, basic patho, and basic skills like assessments, lab values, ABGs, IV skills, etc. I didn't used to have to teach new grads cranial nerves or basic skills.

It shows in the length of our new grads orientation. It's getting longer and longer all the time because they come to use knowing less and less. Hard to concentrate on critical thinking and seeing the whole picture when you have to first learn the basics that should have been taught in nursing school. The ADN grads do seem slightly, but only slightly, better prepared than the BSN and DE MSN grads. It is frustrating. IV skills is a good example. I do not expect any new grad to be skilled in placing IVs, but I do expect them to have an understanding of how to do it and to have done it a few times, at least on a dummy arm. Most importantly I expect them to know what size IV would be appropriate for what patients and to at least know what IV fluids would be appropriate / inappropriate for patients with their diagnosis (D5W for the stroke with cerebral edema anyone?), know the difference between crystalloids and colloids etc, isotonic, hypertonic and so on. I didn't used to have to teach these things. A&P is another. How nurses graduate without being able to explain blood flow through the heart and the names of the heart valves, or be able to tell me the cranial nerves is amazing to me.

I never considered nursing UNTIL, after being wounded in the army as a combat medic in the field, they sent me to work in an army hospital where I worked for and with army nurse corps officers. They opened my eyes to the potential of the profession and how much one could accomplish personally and for others as an RN.

I would like to add that most of those amazing nurse corps officers where reserve officers with ADNs, the regular army officers with BSN having mostly been deployed at that time.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

i feel this way wholeheartedly. probably the summation of my post. can't i be a good nurse without all the extra fluff? how do people find this so impossible ?

You fell WHICH way wholeheartedly. On the right hand corner of each post, you'll see a little rectangle that says "QUOTE". If you click on that, you'll be quoting the post you agree with, and everyone will understand.

[NutmeggeRN, BSN]

haven't been ignoring anyone just been busy ^^ i didnt expect this post to get so explosive lol

ah yes, you did.....

but im looked at as less of a nurse because id rather push meds and titrate drips than to make a bed ?

A well made bed (one that a nickel could bounce off) is better for the patient in many ways and NONE of us are above doing what we can to make our patient:

a) more comfortable

b) better rested

c) at less risk of a skin tear or bedsore

I think that is your own self perception and need to feel good about yourself as a whiz with the IV....careful there, one tiny error with a flow rate can spell disaster for your patient.

[shermrn]

I have been a nurse for 16 years, I have a love/hate relationship with the profession. I love doing what I do, but at the same time I just hate so much of what goes along with nursing. I'm completely wrong for the job, I have aspergers syndrome so interacting with people is very difficult for me. Luckily my patients are infants and interacting with them is completely natural for me. With the parents I get a bit flustered and probably come off seeming a bit odd to some, once the ice is broken I do better. Anyway I feel good about what I do, and enjoy it, couldn't see myself in any other occupation.