Why is it "legal" for patient to decline male nurses?

[carti]

I don't know if that is the right word I'm looking for. Why is it considered "ok" and acceptable for patients to decline male nurses caring for them or even just for procedures such as putting in a Foley?

Background: I'm a senior nursing student (male) and I've had about 3-4 patients my entire nursing school career who refused to have a male nurse come in. For example, today at clinicals, I had a female patient with an order for a Foley before discharge, and she told my preceptor for me to leave the room. Another example, during my 2nd semester, I experienced 2 different occasions where the patient refused to have any care by a male whatsoever.

I feel like that is literally like a White couple coming into a restaurant and refusing service from a Black/Latino server and requesting a white server.

Why can't the hospital just say, " If you don't want a male nurses, then leave?" I think it's crazy that in the year 2019, no one bats an eye if a patient refuses care by a male nurse, and the automatic response is " Don't worry! As a male nurse you have to get used to it! ? "

[Wuzzie]

I also wanted to point out the irony in that the OP previously railed against having to study OB and now he is thinking about going into maternal nursing.

[Mergirlc, MSN, APRN, NP]

56 minutes ago, Wuzzie said:

I also wanted to point out the irony in that the OP previously railed against having to study OB and now he is thinking about going into maternal nursing.

It would be one form of natural birth control if he worked in OB. No baby wants to come out to that attitude.

[Minn_RN]

Please everyone don't think that all of us male nurses share the attitude that cowboy does. Personally if a female prefers a fellow female nurse I will be happy to give away the assignment to a fellow female RN. I feel providing patient with optimal comfort will allow maximum healing.

Cowboy I highly suggest you to reconsider your feelings. Being a guy nurse for 10 years and with many experiences. With your attitude toward this feeling I would highly recommend that if you were to get this upset over this to work in a setting where you only take care of males or change your attitude IMMEDIATELY.

[Corpsman2OncRN, BSN, RN]

3 hours ago, Cowboy96 said:

I'm sorry for your experience, but then again you can say the SAME thing for any ethnicity/gender/race.

If my sister was raped by a black man, would it be ok if everywhere she went to declined to have a black server? Would it be ok if she requested her daughter be removed from her 3rd grade class because her teacher was a black man? Would it be ok if she refused to board a plane because the pilot was black?

Not all people are the same. I still don't see how this affects ANYTHING whatsoever. I want to see how this entire forum would react if there was a good portion of patients who declined White women from being their nurses. Obviously, that would gather way more attention. But since guy only make up a very small portion of nurses, this isn't a "big" issue in the nursing world. Oh well, maybe in 15-20 years, patients will get told to leave if they refused a nurse based on the nurses's identify.

Two points:

One, as a female who has worked in the medical field for the past seven years, I have been refused by males whose religious belief does not allow them to be cared for by females and it did not bother me in the least, so your argument that this isn't a "big" issue just because males are in the minority in the nursing world doesn't really fly, sorry.

And two, although everyone is different, as someone who also has a past history of sexual assault, if I saw someone of the same race/ethnicity serving me at a restaurant NO, it would not bother me. If that person happened to resemble the person more closely, I would probably just leave if it truly made me uncomfortable. But neither of those things are even close to the same as letting someone who makes you uncomfortable see or touch parts of your body not normally exposed to the public, especially when you are already in a vulnerable position as a patient.

I don't know why I'm even bothering to respond as many have already stated the same as I have and you still don't seem to get it, but you really need to take a look at yourself and figure out why you are taking this so personally when it has nothing to do with you or you're not going to have a very enjoyable time as a nurse. Before being assaulted I had no problems with male health care providers and went to a male MD for my pap smears with no problem. Now, I prefer female providers and guess what: it's my call to make, not yours or the hospital's or anyone else's.

[carti, BSN, RN]

2 hours ago, ShadowNurse said:

I sincerely hope your nursing school never sees what you have said here, Cowboy. I would dismiss you from the program if I were your director of nursing education. And I certainly wouldn't let you into medical school either. You are not suited for this line of work in any capacity. Hopefully you do something not dangerous to patients that gets you dismissed instead.

Oh, because I said Hospital legislation needs to be fixed regarding patient refusing Nurses based on the color of their skin and their gender? This is becoming a joke to you guys now probably. My apologies if speaking up against racism/sexism offends you.

[carti, BSN, RN]

3 hours ago, Rose_Queen said:

@Cowboy96, perhaps you should take a good hard long look at your career path. You've started some interesting topics here, this one where you want patients to bend to your will to provide their care despite their fundamental right to autonomy and your post about the "least demanding" nursing jobs so that you can take your remaining medical school prereqs. Health care is not about you unless you are the patient. Health care, and especially nursing, is about returning patients to their optimum level of health. If that means providing them such comfort measures as providing caregivers of a certain gender when dealing with intimate procedures, so be it. Stop making it about you.

What does it matter if I am doing Med school prereqs or finding a least demanding job? What does that affect you in any way? Am I hurting anyone? No. Am I not being safe? No. Am I giving medications unsafely? No. Then what is it to you? If I can pass my NCLEX and graduate from a great BSN program with honors then how about you silence yourself?

Please stop lecturing me about life from an internet post; You don't know me based off a few sentences online. You don't know me at all, I promise.

This thread was about making it unacceptable for discrimination in the workplace, and all I got were responses saying Sexism/Racism are ok if your a nurse. Such backwards thinking here....You might hate that idea....but hey, they used to hate on MLK, and every other progressive idea too....Have a good night.

[Wuzzie]

2 minutes ago, Cowboy96 said:

Such backwards thinking here....You might hate that idea....but hey, they used to hate on MLK, and every other progressive idea too.

You, young man, are no Martin Luther King.

[kbrn2002, ADN, RN]

I haven't read the responses so this has probably already been said. There are any number of valid reasons a patient may not want a person of the opposite sex caring for them, especially when any cares or procedures involving their genitals are involved.

It could be based on conservative religious beliefs, it might be a cultural norm for that patient, it could even be the patient has a history of sexual abuse and sincerely can't tolerate a man near their sexual organs for any reason.

Whatever the reason the patient doesn't owe their healthcare providers an explanation so don't expect one. I do think that those wishes need to be honored. There's not many situations I can imagine when taking the time to switch staff out to accommodate the patient would be an impossible hardship.

[LibraNurse27, BSN, RN]

I'm not sure if "sexism towards men" actually exists, just as "racism against white people" for sure doesn't exist. You can't be discriminated if you are in the position of the most power. For example, I am white and sometimes when I go to visit my fiance's family in an all black neighborhood people ask me not to park in front of their homes. I cannot call this racism or discrimination. I am guessing many of the people in the neighborhood have had negative experiences with people who look like me. I don't take it personally and I move my car.

In that situation technically I don't HAVE to move the car but in a healthcare setting patients do have the right to direct their care. I don't understand why you care if a female patient prefers a female RN. Inserting foleys and wiping butts are not exciting tasks you're missing out on. I certainly don't mind when a male patient requests that I don't help him with his urinal or clean his BM! I am also a rape survivor and while I try not to request only female staff I do become very nervous when I have a male MD for paps. I really hope your post is a joke but if it's not I think you need to spend some time LISTENING (not talking!!!) to women, sexual assault survivors, and people of color. Not everything is about you. Thanks to all the wonderful male nurses who chimed in. Best of luck in your career.

[EKUGRAD, BSN, MSN, RN, CNS]

Wow ! Wuzzie. You knew Dr King and James W ?

[FolksBtrippin, BSN, RN]

18 hours ago, Cowboy96 said:

It's a form of discrimination so obviously I'm going to speak up about this problem. You telling me " Just deal with it" is what they used to tell minorities back in the day when they would argue for their rights. It's people like you who have backwards thinking and are anti-progressive. Whatever tho!

And for sure, I will change my major! After working hard for 4 year for my BSN! I will totally change it when I am 1 semester away from graduating because someone on the internet told me! Lol.............

I didn't tell you to just deal with it.

I don't know how you got through 20 something years of life in the USA thinking you ever have the right to touch someone who doesn't want to be touched by you but here we are.

I am telling you that you will not make it as a nurse with this belief. You need to do more than just deal with it. You need to change or you are going to have big problems.

You have failed to learn cultural competence and nursing ethics in your 4 years of nursing school.

The patients are not there to protect your feelings and your imaginary rights as a man. You have no right to touch anyone. Your nursing care is not your right to give. It is the patient's right to receive good nursing care. And if you become a licensed nurse it is your responsibility to give nursing care.

And you are not showing that you are capable of handling the responsibility. Because if your patient doesn't want you to touch him or her you are obliged to get someone else. If you stand there and say "No, I'm going to be the one to put in your Foley or you can get out, because you can't discriminate against me." You are bullying the patient, and you could actually be guilty of assault and even battery depending on how far it goes. If you threaten a patient with a bogus discrimination complaint or being thrown out of the hospital, and she allows you to insert her Foley out of fear or helplessness you just assaulted her. A criminal prosecution is in order.

I would fire you on the spot as your manager if you did anything like this. Escort you out by security and call the police to report your assault on a patient. And I am very lenient with people.

You don't have much time to change. Your hubris will take you down eventually if you don't.

Consider pharmaceutical sales.

[Wuzzie]

6 hours ago, EKUGRAD said:

Wow ! Wuzzie. You knew Dr King and James W ?

Any idiot knows what Dr. King stood for and it wasn’t some whiny man-child’s right to touch someone against their will which, BTW, is starting to sound a little creepy to me. No, I don’t know James W. But so far my experience leads me to not really want to and I’m sure the feeling is mutual.

And wow! You really burned me. ?