When you hear the word "nurse," do you think male or female?

[OldDude]

I think we can all agree "Nursing" is, "historically," a female profession. And, regardless of male participation today, nursing is still a female dominated profession. I don't think there is anything negative about this fact and I have no issue with female/male nursing ratios or anything associated with the subject so I'm not trying to make any point about that.

It's my opinion "nursing," collectively, is considered a female profession in spite of male participation and notwithstanding the conscious efforts to express the contrary or to express the word "nurse" as gender neutral. I believe this arises from our subconscious mental state and has been established, maybe even with subliminal contributions, from everything we've been exposed to in regard to real life and media representation of "nursing." Over the years, as females entered traditionally male professions, "Fireman" became "Firefighter," "Policeman" became "Police Officer," "Mailman" became "Mail Carrier," etc. As a result, the description changes call attention and introduce the possibility the profession could be female or male. The term "Nurse" has nowhere to go in this regard and, to date, I'm not aware of any effort to replace "Nurse" with any other descriptor.

When you hear the word "nurse," is your immediate mental image a male or female? Say, for instance, if "nurse" came up in a word association game, would you instantaneously see a man or a woman? I see a woman. I believe most of the population sees a woman and I'd like to offer up two personal observations as an explanation.

First, and you can find a multitude of examples just on this site if a writer is not consciously trying to be gender neutral when they refer to a nurse they will use, "she" or "her." Yes, I've seen some exceptions but, overall, this had been my observation. Maybe you could attribute this to female nurse writers on this site but when you expand it to the general population you'll find male's referring to nurses as "she" or "her."

Second; and this one has been the most interesting to me over the years...and the most conclusive to my theory. On a regular basis, at least every week for sure, when I make a phone call and introduce myself..."Hi, this is OldDude, school nurse at XYZ Elementary School," the first response I get is, "Yes ma'am -(micro pause)- I mean yes sir." Same thing when I work at Urgent Care..."Hi, this is OldDude, I'm a nurse at XYZ Urgent care," same thing..."Yes, ma'am -(micro pause)- I mean yes sir." The person I'm talking to realizes I am a man. I have a normal to lower pitched man voice. I introduce myself with a man's name - a name that is only a man's name. But I end the introduction with "nurse." I believe "nurse" is what produces the subconscious response of "Yes ma'am." And then the tail end of their mental slinky arrives and they remember I am a man and say "Yes sir." Some of the people get frustrated and apologize and I assure them it's OK and not to worry. It really doesn't worry me and I kinda find it entertaining. I've never been upset with nurses being referred to as "she" or "her."

So, I'm saying, here we are in 2019, in the world of PC and the likes, nurses are still perceived as women...and I'm exactly OK with that...just an observation.

If you have an opinion about this, I'd like to hear it.

I'd like to hear from other man nurses if you have experienced the same telephone responses.

Or, I'd like to hear from female nurses if they've received a response to their phone calls as "Yes sir - I mean yes ma'am."

Otherwise, thank you for reading.

[Nalon1 RN/EMT-P, BSN, RN]

I get called ma'am on a regular basis, and at 49, balding with a goatee and way overweight, in no way look like a female.

It does not bother me, and most people immediately correct themselves.

I usually get called the Dr at least once a shift, and just polity say no, I am the nurse.

[Bear92, BSN, PhD, RN]

I enjoyed the varied responses and can relate to many of them.

[guest1135744, ADN]

I love this article. Having attended nursing school back in the 90s there were several guys in my small evening/weekend program. I grew up in an environment that  it was, somehow, drilled into my subconscious that girls are nurses and men are doctors. My parents grew up during WW2; what can I say? Anyway, I’m the youngest of 9 and it’s so interesting to me that my siblings cling to antiquated views on gender in general. To them if a guy is a nurse he MUST be gay. You can’t convince them otherwise. When my brother was hospitalized with a set back from cancer he had a gay male nurse and a non gay male nurse.  He said derogatory things about both of them; not in front of them but behind their back and to us. The non gay nurse seemed to bug my brother the most because why would a dude choose a women’s career? Please understand that all of my siblings (7 out of 9) are uneducated beyond high school. I will say, at my brother’s funeral my sibling stood up and made sure to speak about my brother’s comments about his male nurses, it was told to make everyone laugh, I sure didn’t. Also, being the youngest afforded me the special spot that even though I an a nurse, I know absolutely nothing. 

[Mushroomprint]

I work in the OR and occasionally when I walk into the pre-op room I'll get a heavy sigh(usually from male patients). I'll ask them what's wrong and they will say they were hoping for a female nurse. 

[summertx]

On 10/8/2021 at 8:28 AM, Mushroomprint said:

I work in the OR and occasionally when I walk into the pre-op room I'll get a heavy sigh(usually from male patients). I'll ask them what's wrong and they will say they were hoping for a female nurse. 

I think it's probably also for females. I walked into a patient room  and she gave me a frown and said was hoping for the good looking male nurse that usually comes in. Hey I'm not offended.

I am for the 'change the name of the nurse'. Maybe change it to nurse tech, or simply change all nurses to 'charge nurse.'

[nurseparky]

I'm a mid-to-late 40's nurse with a background in construction.  Some have described me as manly/masculine. Often times when I'm meeting new families/patients, I'm either referred to as "doctor" or no one offers a salutation at all as they are unsure of what my role is.  This is obviously a reaction to my perceived gender.  Of course I don't mind; I break the ice with "DOCTOR?! DOCTOR?! I wouldn't be a doctor . . . I'M A NURSE!"  Then everyone breaks out laughing.  It is interesting though, to note that there is an engrained perception of what a nurse's gender might be.  It doesn't offend me, I chalk it up to human nature.  (If only other parts of society were so understanding . . . SIGH).

Oddly enough, the worst times I've had as a nurse in regard to my gender has been from openly gay classmates.  Comments were made, innuendo was inferred, and there was palpable uneasiness from class and faculty as the comments were brushed aside.  Once again, it didn't bother me terribly,  but I made note that incidents of that type would have never been tolerated had it come from a hetero male.  I didn't say anything about it as I didn't feel threatened, but it technically could have been considered sexual harassment.

I live in a pretty conservative area, and religion is strong here too.  I see quite a few female patients who are apprehensive about having a male nurse, but I sit down with them and explain that yes, they have the choice of having a female nurse.  I then explain to them that I am a father of girls and boys, and that I became a nurse as a way to serve.  After sitting with them for a few minutes and just talking with them, I ask them if they want to let me care for them.  I've never had a patient request that I be taken off their team.  I have even had female pediatric hospice patients.  

If you show people your heart, they will see your true intention . . . to serve.

[Bear92, BSN, PhD, RN]

There is so much wisdom and emotional intelligence demonstrated in this post. As a fellow male RN, I appreciated it greatly.

[DavidFR, BSN, MSN, RN]

I once had an embarrasing situation with a partially sighted patient which I can laugh about now. 

This patient only really saw shadows. I didn't think to specify my gender as I had said my name (David) and introduced myself as the infirmier de nuit (night nurse). French is a very gendered language, a male nurse being an infirmier and a female nurse being an infirmière. 

The patient obviously didn't pick up on this and since I have a very neutral voice (sometimes mistaken for a female on the phone) he obviously assumed I was a woman. I didn't click at all. When I came on the following night my day colleague told me he'd said "I had an English infirmière last night. She was absolutely charming, delightful woman."    

I went in ready to explain but was greeted with "Hello beautiful, how was your day?" I didn't have the heart to explain so I quickly made my excuses and left the room. I swapped patients with my colleague who told him that unfortunately the delightful English infirmière had to go home sick. Fortunately I never had to help my colleague in there or answer his bell. 

I can laugh about it now but I was mortified at the time. The root cause? Sexist assumptions! I'd said "infirmier" and given him a masculine first name and yet he still assumes nurse = woman. We have a lot of work to do guys!