REAL NURSING?

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I have been a nurse in LTC for a year now, and I must say that it makes me NUTS that some others do not consider us "NURSES" unless you have done your tour of duty in a hospital, and I have read on some posts that hospitals don't even consider LTC as experience? Really! To all the dedicated LTC/Skilled NURSES out there I think you are all wonderful!:yeah:

Specializes in geriatrics.

As many have said, the nursing process is the same no matter where you work. Same with the basics of infection control, meds, therapeutic communication. And not everyone wants to work in a hospital.

More importantly, geriatrics and palliative care is the future of nursing. The population as a whole is aging. Working with seniors can only serve you well. I love my residents! And LTC is just as valuable as every other nursing specialty.

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Geriatrics, LTC.

The only people who would say that LTC is not "REAL NURSING" have never done it ! What's not real about trach care, colostomy care, wound care, suctioning, tube feeds, narc counts, med pass, administrative duties, charge nurse to 4 CNA's, charting, treatments, dressing changes and for 40 patients, not the usual 5-7 those other nurses have in hospitals! ...sounds like real nursing to me!

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Specializes in LTC, Hospice, Case Management.
I've always worked hospitals because I love critical care, but I always imagined LTC to be one of the closest to the old fashioned ideal of Florence Nightingale. Bedside, compassionate care.

Ah, you made me laugh! I appreciate the fact that you said you are just "imagining LTC", but let me assure you, we are not wandering around the hallways casually like Nightingale with time to be compassionate and caring. We are just plain running our orifice's off trying to get the unlimited tasks done. I only wish we had extra time to listen and provide more compassion to our people. This is kind of the point of the thread. Many nurses are surprised to find that we have complex wounds, wound vacs, feeding tubes, IV's, trachs, peritoneal dialysis, IV meds, etc.

When you send those sick people out the door to us, they didn't magically get better during the ambulance ride. Every year we are getting more and more complicated residents. We are running the med surg units of just 5-10 years ago, but we do it with a staffing ration of 20:1 - 30:1, no on-site MD's, no on-site lab, no-onsite pharmacy, etc. It's craziness!

Thanks for giving us the opportunity to enlighten you about our world

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Specializes in LTC.
I've always worked hospitals because I love critical care, but I always imagined LTC to be one of the closest to the old fashioned ideal of Florence Nightingale. Bedside, compassionate care.

I beg to differ.

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Specializes in LTC.
You forgot to list a few of your jobs:

a plumber

therapist

social worker

housekeeper

seamstress

hospice worker

and let's not forget customer service rep!

And just tell them RN stands for Real Nurse...

Maintenance Woman.

TV repairwoman

Waitress

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