michelle.danda

I think it's more than that. Well, I know that the rationale is more than that and it is not something that it decided arbitrarily by "management".

But I think the point is, who is the "uniform" for? It is sometimes easier to wear scrubs, but what is the purpose of scrubs? On medical and surgical wards scrubs are meant for the purpose of easily identifying blood/debris/dirt and because they are easy to change in and out of to minimize the spread of things. On a psych unit, I considering that ideally it should be a psychosocial environment where medical procedures are not done, why wear scrubs? I think that it is true that for the most part clients in psych do know that they are in the hospital but does this mean that scrubs need to be worn that definitely identify a client as a mental health patient? I think that wearing scrubs in mental health really increases the stigma of a client for example when you are accompanying them out in the community like for a walk or on outings etc. I have worked on an inpatient concurrent disorder unit, neuropsych, mood disorders and now a longer term tertiary mental health rehab unit and I think that it would do harm to wear scrubs. I do agree that it is something that needs to be studied more as it seems like there is now a move in psychiatry (especially in the US?) towards medical models which is unfortunate.

this is the website for the college of nurses in Vancouver. All the info you need should be on it and if you email them they reply really quickly. http://www.crnbc.ca/ Michelle Danda