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?
First of all, please don't use the term mid-level like we are somewhere between professional and non-professional. Secondly, we are not "quasi" anything! We are professionals working within our scope of practice. Yes, I wear a white lab coat with my name and credentials embroidered on it.
There are practical reasons to wear the white coat. Especially in a lab, to protect your clothes and body. I've also heard male doctors say they wear the coats for practical reasons when they examine an "attractive" female patient for example. I don't think that the "white coat" was meant to be a fashion statement. It was meant as a garment to protect your clothing or cover your clothing when you are in a professional environment.
I think one reason for wearing white is because you can use bleach if necessary to keep it clean and white. I worked in the day when nurses wore all white. White stockings, shoes and everything. When I started wearing scrubs and different colors, I guess I felt liberated. Scrubs are definitely a lot easier to work in. I work in an area where we use a lot of bleach now, and unfortunately my scrubs get the white dotted look way too often.
Specializes in ER, ICU/CCU, Open Heart OR Recovery, Etc.
I have always worn white lab coats. I like the extra room in the pockets where I can realistically keep things without them spilling out like they have while wearing a scrub warmup.
Regarding professional appearance, I wash them regularly and don't have problems with ink stains.
Specializes in Crit Care; EOL; Pain/Symptom; Gero.
Oppressed group theory has been used to explain why nurses and other health care professionals wear white lab coats.
In an effort to become equal to or blend in with the oppressors (physicians), those who are oppressed will attempt to take on the characteristics of the oppressors by *being* like them and dressing like them.
We had a CNS at my first job who tended to wear a long white coat around. The hospital logo and his name, originally blue in stitching, were above either breast pocket. It appeared that at one point he probably attempted to bleach the coat, and the result was fuchsia stitching. He was a very nice guy but the bleached fuchsia lab coat, attempt to perhaps appear "doctorly" by wearing a white coat in the first place, and the fact that nobody really understood what it was he did for a living all made him seem like a little bit of a joke.
Additionally, I have to admit to feeling a little twinge of embarrassment when speaking to residents in the morning and seeing my nurse manager skitter up in her white coat to reprimand somebody about not giving report at the bedside or something of the like. I fear it kind of might make nurses appear, to physicians, a bit laughable. Unprofessional techs who need to be micromanaged by their ridiculous MBA-touting boss who is trying to look like a physician.
Sorry, I know neither example is really nice or fair, just observations I've made that indicate the nursing profession still has a little way to go in some settings to really be taken seriously. I don't believe that it is inherently wrong for a nurse to wear a white coat, but it sure can look a bit laughable.
I work at a small practice- there are 3 "clinical nurses" including myself and the MD. He and I both wear white lab coats. I was asked to wear one, along with solid colored scrubs, to set myself apart from the other 2 staff members. They happen to be MAs where I am an LPN.
My lab coat isn't your typical cheapo, plain, lab coat. They are fitted and embroidered with my name and the facility name.
I do get questioned often as to my "rank/degree."
I thought it was strange that he asked me to wear a lab coat but I do stand out from my colleagues. His explanation is that the patients feel that I am not just a support staff member but someone with the experience and intelligence of a provider. They feel more comfortable discussing things with me because they see me as an equal to him. Which is what he wanted them to see me as.
i don't wear the long white coat as that was not typically a nurses lab jacket. When I wear the white it is simply a throw back to the day when the color for nurses was all white - I have been a nurse that long and frankly miss the all white look - i earned that. Nurses were just then being allowed to forgo that nasty cap when I started and we no longer had to jump up to give the doctor our seats when they came into the nurses station. At the adventist system in Florida, only administration is allowed to wear a white jacket. Floor nurse have to wear a royal blue one.
Lab coats are professional and clean. You shouldn't be speaking for others who are professionals...
Drew Totten, MSN, BS, RN, CLNC
I strongly disagree that lab coats, generally, are clean. I don't know if you meant "they have a clean appearance" or whatever, and while that may be true to a layperson, lab coats are not truly clean items to wear around. For one thing, lab coats are usually worn multiple times, sometimes for weeks, without being laundered, unlike a set of scrubs or some business casual outfit that you wear for one day then take to the laundress before wearing them again. They also get gritty and dirty when hung over chairs. I've even seen on-call doctors put those gritty, dirty lab coats back on after they dragged on the floor so that they can go to their on-call room and sleep in a nice, gritty, dirty bed for the night.
To the idea that they look clean: lab coats also show pen marks, coffee stains, and very bad wrinkles in the *** region.
I have two very nice lab coats with the hospital logo. There are two reasons that I have not been wearing mine. I am post-menopausal and it is too damn hot. I am waiting to have it embroidered once I see if the state recognizes me as a CNS. Do you make assumptions about someone wears a lab coat? Do you think they are snobby, etc? For most of us who have been nurses for some time, it is not like that at all. It is just a matter of being told that this is part of the "uniform." Our CNO likes us to wear them. They also have the staff wearing a certain colour with the facility logo. Truthfully, I loved the coloured cartoon and floral scrubs. They were comfortable and allowed you to express yourself. Most people kept their uniforms clean and neat. Patients often loved the prints. Though I know there is research out there to support the standard uniforms, I remain a bit skeptical. When I graduated in 1987, we wore all white and the cap for at least my first two years as an RN. I feel like we are going full circle. Scrubs are much better than the awful white dress and cap which was accompanied by white bobby pins for the cap which often fell off and tilted, the white underwear (including slip), and white hose. The rationale for clinging to the whites was that patients (and DOCTORS) needed to know who the nurse was. When I wore tweety scrubs, patients always knew I was the nurse. They did not think I was housekeeping or dietary. Very occasionally, I was asked if I was the doctor, especially the ped. It is truly what is underneath the scrubs or white coat, not the garment. How you look (as long as you are clean and tidy) or even what your name tag says, speaks in a very soft voice as compared to who you are and how you approach patients or family or other HCP's. White dress and cap, white coat, cartoon scrubs, I am a nurse because of what I know and what I do. It is fine to give attention to appearance. We need to let nurses be nurses by giving them an opportunity to their job well with adequate staffing, good tools, and continuing education. Believe me, I think most of us are just abiding by the dress code, not making some huge statement. We have a lot of other things to worry about.
I hope your attitude does not reflect how you deal with people. There are more things in nursing to worry about than a white lab coat, are you kidding me. That is a piece of clothing that according to the healthcare field you might just run into someone wearing a lab coat. This is not the police dept, or wall street, this is healthcare and we wear white lab coats because that's who we are. You know how many people have stopped me in the hall way or walking around my facility who asked me for directions to a certain part of the hospital or wear might they find this department. If you have a problem that serious about wearing a white lab coat then maybe you are burnt out and need a vacation, because believe me people sacrifice a lot of time, effort, and family in school just to earn the right to wear one. So with that said sweetheart, just go back to the day when you graduated nursing school and passed your boards, was a white coat a problem for you then; I think not so move on and do what we do best and save lives and put smiles on family members who are also sitting at the bedside.
skglick
3 Posts
First of all, please don't use the term mid-level like we are somewhere between professional and non-professional. Secondly, we are not "quasi" anything! We are professionals working within our scope of practice. Yes, I wear a white lab coat with my name and credentials embroidered on it.