Questions from a nursing student

Sour Lemon · Sep 25, 2018

Hi! I am a nursing student about to graduate in December. One of my assignments is to get on a forum and ask 2 questions and get feedback.
1. Doyou see discrimination against nurses/aids/staff that are homosexual?
2. Asfar as nurses "eating their young" Do you often see that happen? Whatadvice for a new grad do you have in dealing with a situation where an experiencenurse is "eating the young"?
Thankyou so much for answering my questions and helping me out!!

I don't see any issues with homosexual staff. I also live in a very liberal area.

Do a site search for the second question and you'll get a few thousand results. It's a cooked, too well done, burnt, not so tasty, cliche of a question.

nursej22, MSN, RN · Sep 25, 2018

1. I have not seen discrimination against homosexual staff. But I too live in a liberal area.

2. My agency does not hire new graduates, so I do not see this.

Advice to new grads? Find out the difference between coaching, constructive criticism and this eating business. Realize that not everyone is your friend, everyone has their own issues to deal with, and it ain't all about you.

Nursing can be a high stress job, and many nurses are sleep-deprived and missing their families, may be approaching burn out.

KelRN215, BSN, RN · Sep 28, 2018

1) No but I live in Massachusetts. I imagine the answer may be different in places like Alabama or Mississippi.

2) This term is way overused. The current generation of young nurses are from the "everyone gets a trophy" generation and they don't know how to accept constructive criticism. It's not "eating your young", for example, if a new grad makes a mistake and you are the nurse following her and you have to point it out because, for some reason, the patient you're picking up didn't get his q 8hr vanco at all during her 12 hr night shift. I've never seen it actually happen. I've also not worked anywhere that hires new grads in the past 6 years.

peachtreednurse, RN · Sep 29, 2018

Never saw discriminatory treatment toward those living alternate lifestyles, but have seen the negative response to the "I'm new", before a question or as an excuse, for some oversight, too frequently voiced.

TessLJ · Oct 5, 2018

1) No but I live in Massachusetts. I imagine the answer may be different in places like Alabama or Mississippi.

I live and work in Alabama, and while I can't say it never happens, I have never seen discrimination against homosexuals in my 25 years of nursing experience here.

Ellekat2 · Oct 5, 2018

1) I live in a red state in a rural area. I have not seen any discrimination against an employee because of his/her lifestyle choice. However, the employees never made a point of advertising their lifestyle choices. I have seen what I regard as an institutional bias, where same-sex couples (married in a different state) were required to fill out paperwork for POA, etc., that would not be required of a heterosexual couple in order to ensure that the partner had a say in the patient's care if needed.

2) I live on the other side of that equation. Everything I do is questioned and I'm often told that I'm doing something "wrong" because it's not what the new nurse learned in school. For years, I was scheduled to work more holidays, etc., because my kids were grown and I had to fight for a holiday off. If I snap at a young nurse, it is more likely to be because her (I'm simply picking the predominent sex; I do know that male nurses exist) personality has gotten to me than because I am deliberately trying to make her feel bad about herself or the job she does. We're a team; any time I make a member of that team feel badly about her skills, I lower the level of care we give the patients. However, there are times I need a break from constant questioning regarding what I do and a critique of how and why I do it. Every relationship is different; each person has to decide how much/what is tolerated and when corrective action is needed, even in a work relationship.