QueenNurse

I have to smile a lot when I read Nurse Guy. He's so very young and uneducated at this time. I'd be very interested to see where his opinions land in a few years with some real clinical experience behind him and a lot more life experience under his belt. Being a student is a great place from which to chastise the world. Being in the middle of life and actually seeing how it works will change an opinion more efficiently than any argument.

I like it too, but then I seem to be one of the few on this board who actually like and are fulfilled by being a nurse. Heck, I even like the little jingle that goes with it!:) Presenting a profession in a positive light does not mean it's unrealistic. Exactly how much stuff do you think they can get into a 30 sec. commercial? And I'd much rather have the positive side of our profession shown than the negative. Does this mean I am a Polly-Anna about nursing? No. I understand the problems and have made a point to be part of the group working to solve our issues instead of just griping about them. I strongly believe we nurses spend way too much time with negative talk and much too little on creating solutions to our issues. If this commercial presents nursing in a positive light and makes people think about choosing nursing as a career then all the more better!

Snooped, If you are going to get really picky you should look at your own quote: "If your an RN and are envious," That would be YOU ARE and so should be contrated as you're.

...and if your hospital is going the way of most, minims will never be used at all. The new focus on safer practice and the change in what kind of abbreviations are allowed is having "minims" drop by the wayside. The symbol looks too much like the number 3, no one has any measuring tools for minims any more and cc are more accurate. I'm suprised it's being taught!

You know what? I don't really care what it's "real purpose" is supposed to be. I love that commercial in that it shows nurses, men and women, in a professional setting doing a professional job and has a bright happy feeling about it. I'm not sure what you are so upset over. This is a whole lot of emotion on a very little thing. The problems getting into nursing school are caused as much by the lack of qualified instructors as anything else. And it's helped by the fact that nursing is now seen as a profession where you can make a decent living at. I'm not saying we make the most in the world but we do have lots of flexibility, lots of options and incomes that let us support our families. And hospitals have been using unskilled labor for all of eternity. About every 10 years or so someone will decide they can hire people with 6 weeks of training and have them do much of the nursing "tasks". It lasts a few years and then the studies come out showing that nosicomial infections rise and hospital stays are lengthened and then they go back to hiring LVN/RNs. I don't want a commercial that says I WANT AN RN. I have worked with a lot of great LVNs and I would not want to discount their role and the help they give me.

Shotzie, I totally understand what you mean about nurses spreading misinformation. We have trouble too with our nurses giving telephone advice that is not approved on our protocols. We caught one RN telling her 18 year old patient with asthma that they didn't need to take a flu shot until they were in their 60's and we had already distributed the CDC's info and our doctor-recommended info that tells who should have a flu shot. Nurses owe it to their patients, their jobs and their profession to keep up with what's going on in the medical world. Everyone should take at least one professional journal. If you can't afford it, at least get on the Web and cruise the good sites like the CDC, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Diabetes Association, American Liver Foundation, etc, etc. Stay away from the places where the doctor is selling their own products or promoting their own personal agendas in medicine. As far as people getting Guillian-Barre from a flu shot. That link is nebulous at best. They've never been able to reproduce it or duplicate it in research conditions ever since. The warnings not to take a shot if you have every had anything like G-B is said in a "just to be safe" effort" by the FDA. And it's very, very rare, even during the swine flu year. It would be highly unlikely for two people in the same city, much less the same dorm to have contracted it.

Too much for one thread. Try asking each question separately. And Cindy, just a word to the wise, you have posted a lot of personal information on the internet. Please be very careful in doing this. An open thread like this is not the place for you to give this much info. We've already seen some people have their posts come back and bite them in the b**t and I'd hate to see that happening to you.