:angryfire i had to take my 11 month old to the immediate care. he has chicken pox. the ma is talking and my 4 year old asks if her brother is going to get a shot. the ma says, "no, he won't get a shot." my 4 year old (who can read) says, "how do you know?" the ma says because "i'm the nurse and i know." my daughter looks at her name tag and says "m.a., that doesn't spell nurse. my mom is a nurse and her name tag says l.p.n. your name tag has to say l.p.n or r.n. to be a nurse." ( i about died laughing(inside) but i was also embarrassed by my precocious 4 year old.) then the ma says to my daughter, "if you're mom is such a great nurse, she wouldn't have to be here with me taking care of your brother."
ok. w** t the h**l did you just say? fire starts rolling out of my ears. i stated to her, "that is your opinion. i am here to receive treatment from a dr., for my son, not treatment from you. i am sorry if my daughter offended you, but she is correct. you cannot represent yourself as a nurse, you do not have a nursing license. a medical assistant is not the same as a nurse. your attitude is very rude and i feel that you need a better bedside manner. please do not ever speak to me or to any other patient in that manner."
she slams down her equipment and states, "i cannot work with all these know-it-all mothers that are nurses." she then storms out of the room. the dr. who had been in the hallway about to come in the door, states to me,"i apologize for her behaviour. that was uncalled for" ummm, yeah, do you think so?
I think you need to get over it. CMAs are NOT LPNs. Those job posts are just stating that they would take a CMA or a LPN. The two jobs are not the same.
I hate to play the monkey card here. But I can still remember my first semester when my instructor explained the role of the nurse. She put a picture up on the screen of a chimp and said, "A Monkey can be taught how to do vital signs, but not how to think critically, nurses take the technical skills and apply them critically". Nurses are taught how to think critically, that is one of the major difference between the LPN and the CMA in the medical office...they may perform skills the same way, but they think and use rational worlds apart. And no, I am not calling MAs monkeys...or I would be saying I was once a monkey...I am a CMA that graduated with honors from a CC, I am graduating next month--honors-- with my BSN; I too know the difference.
I don't think that all nurses here hate MAs, I just think they have all worked hard for their title and continue to work hard in their title, so they get irked when an MA tries to claim they are a nurse, or worse in my opinion, say they are just like a nurse. I have busted my orifice for the last 5 years getting my BSN and it is no comparison to my MA education on work; not to say I did no work hard for that either...there is just NO comparison...
I have edited some of the posts above, could I just make a request that all posters remain respectful, this type of thread is at risk of of deteriorating into personal attacks so could we please stick to discussing the topic and not individual posters.
WOW!! I have to post again. I was an office manager for several years and YES I did write out scripts, and YES I did call them in for the pts to the pharmacy. That is NOT an uncommon practice. When I worked on the floor at the hospital, I would call down to the pharmacy to have the meds delivered to the floor per the docs orders. No questions were ever asked. Being asthmatic and spending alot of time in the ER the scripts I recieve now are typed and signed by the doc. I highly doubt the doc sits down at the computer and types each and every script out for me.
Well, the nursing students that come to my unit spend 2 hours looking up information in their one patients chart, do about 2 hours of patient care, and then spend 2 hours talking about it in "post conference". So if all that counts, I guess they would get more "clinical experience".
My comment was for the poster that said MA's get little to no training at all.
So why is that nurses seem to hate MA's? I mean all MA's, not just the one that makes stupid, unprofessional comments in front of patients?
I worked for a Pediatrician for 13 years. Started as an LPN then went back to school and got my RN when I was working there. I was the only LPN in my town of 40,000, everyone else was a MA. Only a few had gone to school, and no one else in my office had any formal training, just on the job training. My PCP right now has 3 MA's, and none of them have had any formal training.
I don't hate MA's. Some of them I worked with were pretty good, but still had many holes in their education and were at times scary.
I had to laugh when reading your post! Like some others said, your 4 year old deserves some ice cream. I would love to have been a fly on the wall there. That was PRICELESS!!! That is one thing that just really TICKS me off. If you want to call yourself a nurse, then do what we did and suck it up and go to school and earn it.
I guess I'm the only one who thinks that there is either no way a four year old would ever say that, word for word as written, or you have more or less indoctrinated a child as to office politics at a hospital.
nope, i'm doing it now. something being more difficult doesn't make your title sacrosanct. nurse is a pretty general term for caregiver, i know a lot of people who call aids and anyone in scrubs "nurse". like i said, seems like a petty thing to worry about.
i usually don't allow myself to comment on these types of threads, as i don't like to add to the conflict. however, after reading this quote, i must comment.
"nurse" is not a general term for a caregiver when used in the professional setting (hospital, ltc facility, clinic, etc). i am a registered nurse. i am the person who coordinates the care for my patients. i have cnas to assist me; pt/ot/st, radiology, lab-all of these disciplines also work with my patients. but when it all hits the fan-my butt is the one on the line. i am responsible for that patient!
no, it is not a petty thing to worry about. i correct patients when they call the cna "nurse" and i tell the cna the same thing. all rns in our facility now wear badges that say "rn" in big white letters on a red background...this helps everyone to easily identify the nurse, because as you said, it is hard to distinguish with everyone from nursing to dietary to housekeeping wearing scrubs.
you say you're in school now. please don't take your role as a nurse lightly. it is your license to earn, but it is also your license to lose. you will think differently when you are the one responsible. it has nothing to do with difficulty, and everything to do with your responsibilities and scope of practice.
your view of "nurse" and the general publics is different then.
no, it is not a petty thing to worry about. i correct patients when they call the cna "nurse" and i tell the cna the same thing.
we disagree, i would hate to have a snotty nurse who spent her time worrying about correcting patients who may have called a nurse aid, nurse and was on my back to make sure i corrected them every time.
titles, and symbols, i don't get the attachment.
it's like professor who have doctorates demanding you call them dr. instead of professor. someone’s awful proud of themselves.
Now someone has said misrepresenting yourself as a nurse is illegal. I think you will find that law mainly applies to practicing as a rn/lpn and trying to ger hired as an rn/lpn but if you think you can find someone to prosecute an ma saying nurse as she takes a history or whatever from a young child, be my guest.
libnat, I see that you are a "pre-nursing student", if you get into a nursing program you will likely be taught right off the bat the importance of the title of RN or LPN and exactly why it is not only illegal but dangerous to misrepresent yourself.
your view of "nurse" and the general publics is different then.
we disagree, i would hate to have a snotty nurse who spent her time worrying about correcting patients who may have called a nurse aid, nurse and was on my back to make sure i corrected them every time.
titles, and symbols, i don't get the attachment.
it's like professor who have doctorates demanding you call them dr. instead of professor. someone's awful proud of themselves.
there have been cases where cnas and other non-licensed personnel have given advice to patients and the patient died or suffered other harm because of it. one case that comes to mind happened several years ago in pa when a patient in metabolic alkylosis was complaining of stomach upset. the aide who led the patient to believe she was a nurse, told the patient to take pepto, which she provided. the patient died.
it is not a petty difference when a patient doesn't know who is the nurse and who is not.
and the general public doesn't always see nurses in the correct role in part, because they think anyone in scrubs is a nurse, and those people don't have the education a nurse does.
people have to trust in the person who is taking care of them, and that means presenting onself accurately as far as professional title.
in most states because of this, the title "nurse" is a legally protected one and anyone stating they are had better have that license to prove it. otherwise that person may be facing legal charges.
your view of "nurse" and the general publics is different then.
we disagree, i would hate to have a snotty nurse who spent her time worrying about correcting patients who may have called a nurse aid, nurse and was on my back to make sure i corrected them every time.
titles, and symbols, i don't get the attachment.
it's like professor who have doctorates demanding you call them dr. instead of professor. someone's awful proud of themselves.
no, i am not a "snotty" nurse. i am a nurse who studied hard to be where i am. we, as nurses are to be patient advocates and educators. i am not rubbing my "title" in-i am letting my patients know who is responsible for them on a particular shift; who will be administering their medications and assessing them; who will be talking with their family about their care; who will be calling the md if there is a change in condition. being a registered nurse is a very big responsibility (am i repeating myself here?) and i take it seriously.
as far as the general public is concerned, it is up to us to educate them about our role as registered nurse. yes, my family members tried to "nurse" my dad back to good health when he was dying of cancer. but not one of them to this day assumes that they can step into my shoes at the hospital and be a nurse. (the word may be used as both a noun and a verb.)
perhaps you do not see the importance of the "rn" after my name: however, for the sake of my patients and their well-being, i do.
HeartsOpenWide, RN
1 Article; 2,889 Posts
I hate to play the monkey card here. But I can still remember my first semester when my instructor explained the role of the nurse. She put a picture up on the screen of a chimp and said, "A Monkey can be taught how to do vital signs, but not how to think critically, nurses take the technical skills and apply them critically". Nurses are taught how to think critically, that is one of the major difference between the LPN and the CMA in the medical office...they may perform skills the same way, but they think and use rational worlds apart. And no, I am not calling MAs monkeys...or I would be saying I was once a monkey...I am a CMA that graduated with honors from a CC, I am graduating next month--honors-- with my BSN; I too know the difference.
I don't think that all nurses here hate MAs, I just think they have all worked hard for their title and continue to work hard in their title, so they get irked when an MA tries to claim they are a nurse, or worse in my opinion, say they are just like a nurse. I have busted my orifice for the last 5 years getting my BSN and it is no comparison to my MA education on work; not to say I did no work hard for that either...there is just NO comparison...