I've been a nurse for more than 25 years. I have worked in Acute, Sub-Acute, LTC, Corrections, and School Nurse clinical settings. My first love in nursing has always been working with the geriatric population in LTC. I'm going to, "just cut to the chase". I currently work in LTC. I am not prejudice, I am not a bigot, nor am I a racist. I love working with people no matter their ethnicity, racial make-up, or their religious beliefs. Where I work the majority of the nurses are Filipino. I know you have figured out where I'm going with this. Remember, the topic I have listed above. The Elephant In The Room. Is there a written law, or code somewhere that says you have to be a Filipino nurse in order to work in LTC? The original DON at the facility I work at, was white. A matter of fact, she hired me. In my orientation class at the time, the racial make-up in class was, Black, Indian, Hispanic, and White nurses. There were no Asian nurses in our group. Later on when given a tour of the facility the vast majority of the nurses were ALL Filipino, and I remember seeing only 2 White nurses, and 1 Black nurse. That was it! Eventually the DON that hired us was fired.
IMO she was a very good DON who fought hard for the nurses. Especially the ones that were hired in my group. The acting DON (who is Filipino), began to hire ONLY Filipino nurses. She is NOT FAIR when it comes to issues that need to be addressed about individual nurses, especially if they're Filipino. She will write you up if you are not Filipino, however. I could go on, and on about this, but I want. Oh yeah, by the way, Tagalog is spoken not only in front of patients and visitor's, but even during shift report. Is this prevalent through out the nursing field, especially in LTC? And for the one's who reply to this article, please do not write, get another job. Really? As if that's so easy, especially for seasoned nurses like myself. Be blessed.
The Alzheimers Dementia Unit where my mother resides has almost all black staff. CNA, LVN, RN. They are wonderful and I have no issues with my mom's care.
I think the only way to get rid of the elephant is to sit down with your DON and in a non threatening way, tell her you feel you are being treated differently from other staff because you are white and they are all Filipino? I would hope she is a mature enough DON to be able to deal with your comments in an equally non threatening way.
You could both agree you want what is best for the patients. You both want a happy work environment.
If you could give her some specific incidents where you felt you were treated differently from co-workers? You could both agree to keep the discussion professional, put a time limit on how long you are going to discuss the issue. You can't expect to resolve the issue in one 10 minute meeting. Maybe agree to meet for 15 minutes once a week, get to know one another, and just talk about it?
You could bring a slice of cherry pie, she could bring some traditional Filipino dessert?
Libby1987
3,726 Posts
That demographic is common in the Central Valley and from what I've read here, in pockets of LA.
The opposite is where I live, which seems the most non diverse place left in California. I don't think it makes the LTC jobs any easier though.