This thread is designed to explore why nursing professionals and other professionals wear white lab coats to work. As most of us know, medical doctors have had a long history of wearing white lab coats. We also see PAs and APRNs wearing white lab coats, which makes sense to me, given that mid-levels are quasi-colleagues of MDs and prescribers in their own right.
However, I have even seen nurse managers, nurse educators, case managers, and skin team nurses running around hospitals in those long white lab coats. Why? It has even gotten to the point where sometimes I'll walk onto a unit and there are more people wearing white lab coats than there are "normal employees." It's hardly even a status symbol anymore, certainly not when more people are wearing them in a given situation than not.
Some of you may disagree with this, but I think white lab coats are ugly as hell and that wearing one demonstrates an utter lack of style. It's become what people are wear when they can't figure out how to put together an impressive outfit. If I were a mid-level practitioner, I wouldn't EVER wear a white lab coat if I could help it. I'd rather wear well-fitted, professional clothing.
Besides having no style, there are other downsides to wearing those long white lab coats. For one thing, they show everything. I can't even begin to count how many times I've seen people in those coats with black pen marks all over. That's professional looking. Or how about when people drape their lab coats over the backs of swivel chairs? Someone then sits down and starts idly rolling their chair around while the bottom of the person's lab coat drags along a nice gritty, dirty floor. Then they can come back and put on their nice, gritty, dirty lab coat. Ewwwwww.
Alternatively, someone will sit down in a chair with the lab coat still on and it gets all scrunched up under their buttocks. Have you ever noticed how EXTREMELY wrinkled those long white lab coats are in the back? Bingo. That's why. Just look around next time you're at work. The backs of everyone's lab coats are wrinkled and it looks terrible.
So... what is the point of them? If you wear one of these white coats, what is the purpose? Do you like how it looks? Is there some amazing utility to these coats than isn't afforded by normal clothing? Okay -- they have a lot of pockets. I can see the benefit of those pockets if you're working in a lab or are carrying a lot of instruments. However, if you're a paper pusher like a case manager or a unit manager, then what are all the pockets for? What am I missing here?
Perhaps I am sentimental because I come from a family of nurses but I have always loved the white coats, nursing caps, and comfy work shoes with the little blue heart on the heel. Recognize.
Oh, me too. My mom looked so badass in her nurse's uniform: White dress, white stockings, white shoes, cap, red lipstick and a cigarette!
I hate the white lab coats, or any coat for that matter. As an APRN student I'm required to wear one during clinical hours. I just dont like the thing dangling around and it just feels like it gets in the way. I would much rather just wear office clothes without the coat or scrubs. I don't need to exude prowess as I would much rather be comfortable. My patients get a healthy dose of who I am when I enter the room anyway, coat not needed! (no offense to those that like wearing them).
Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.
All scrubs lack style, not just white coats.
I am an educator working in a clinic. I see patients for initial consult and follow up as well as at the surgery centers prior to being taken to the OR. I wear a white coat because:
1. It looks professional.
2. It helps differentiate me from the surgery center staff in the eyes of both the staff and patients.
3. It helps differentiate my role from that of the medical assistants in the clinic.
4. It helps the MDs and PAs see me as a colleague.
I hate the white lab coats, or any coat for that matter. As an APRN student I'm required to wear one during clinical hours. I just dont like the thing dangling around and it just feels like it gets in the way. I would much rather just wear office clothes without the coat or scrubs. I don't need to exude prowess as I would much rather be comfortable. My patients get a healthy dose of who I am when I enter the room anyway, coat not needed! (no offense to those that like wearing them).
That's why I love psych. White coats are discouraged as looking too institutional, and anything that has the appearance of significantly elevating us above our patients is frowned upon. When I'm in my paying job as an RN I'm the wardrobe version of a mullet - dress shirt on the top, cargo pants on the bottom (pockets, right?). And a badge with the letters "RN" so big and color coded you can spot us across the unit.
In clinic as an NP student I'm business casual all the way. I don't need a lab coat in that setting. If they don't know who I am when they come in, my introduction and the fact that I'm behind the desk usually clear up what my role is.
All my Dialysis scrubs were with some sort of style, but I do not miss them,:nono:especially I do not miss to wash them and ironing. Nowadays in Pych/addiction I was told not to wear white coats. I am still with white tunic, jacket, wamus and blouse above my formal dress.
Because our dress code demands that we do. I'm a unit manager in LTC and I have to wear one. I hate it. I don't have the $ to buy a new one every few months when the sleeves get grody and it's too warm for me in the summer as well as too cold in the winter. =/
We are allowed to wear white or blue coats at my job. I think they have now allowed black, and if so, I'm buying one because it will match my Danskos :) The problem with my blue coat is that it tends to clash with my pants. All of my pants are greys anatomy and the exact same shade of blue. If I could match it, I'd wear blue. None of my coats are long though.
Because I had to have a white one for nursing school as part of my dress code. At my current job we can wear white or royal blue coats (our scrub color is royal blue) and I'm not going to waste money on a blue coat when I have a perfectly good white one. I wash it every weekend in bleach so it stays white. I've had it 6 years now, one of these days I'll break down and buy a blue once but not before I've worn a hole in my white one. Now if my white coat offends you so much you are more than welcome to buy me a blue one if you would like [emoji106]ðŸ»
Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
OP, would you change your opinion of white lab coats if they were fitted, or I mean more tailored? Check this line of uniforms at Medelita...I think the models and their lab coats conform to your ideal mold of lady doctors in hard soled shoes and guy docs with well-oiled hair. BTW, I know some colleagues who buy from that website and they actually do look sharp.
The nursing school I went made us wear them when we went in the day before clinicals to gather our patient information. One nurse on my unit wears a short white one over his uniform. One of my supervisors does and NM sometimes, also the Residents and PAs do all the time.
Where I work, it is explicitly written in the dress code that any nurse off their "floor" should be wearing a white coat over their scrubs. Does that mean I need to wear a coat to go to the cafeteria? We don't. I think the white coat is meant as a quasi infection control coverup but it's just that, quasi. Not a fan of the white coats either, I've never worn one.
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Farawyn
12,646 Posts
Oh, me too. My mom looked so badass in her nurse's uniform: White dress, white stockings, white shoes, cap, red lipstick and a cigarette!