Nursing

[ismnotwasm]

The American Nurses Association recently changed it's official Journal to "American Nurse Today" from "American Journal of Nursing" Now, I was no big fan of AJN, but I open this new Journal today and find while the journal has the usual useful and informative information, it has an irritating article on what nurses wear.

Even though I'm in a profession that is mostly female, the actual topic wasn't my problem.
My problem was this;
"In the early 20th century, new findings about germs and their role in spreading infection helped popularize the white nursing uniform. Nurses continued to wear white until the 1960's, when feminists decided white symbolized diminished power. Elizabeth Norman, nursing professor That New York University and author ot two books on the history of nursing states, "In the constant struggle for independence from doctors, some nurses started to see the white uniform as a symbol of the angelic, demure, dependent woman--not the tough resourceful professional she really is"

The article goes one to about nurses wearing pants suits and finally scrubs. It mentions that so do "orderlies, technicians, aides, and maintenance and dietary staff"
In other words, who are the nurses?

She then goes on to say the doctors often still wear a "white lab coat over business clothing"

Ok. So why am I irritated? First, in my experience, doctors also wear scrubs, and I know several nurses who wear white lab coats. Secondly, the article fails to mentions that women doctors are closing in on 50 percent.
Elsewhere in the article it mentions a forced return to white in one health care facility as an identifier for nurses and indicates that the general scrub wearing by hospital personal may be a deliberate attempt to hide the nursing shortage.

Fine. (Half the time on my unit I'm in an isolation gown so it doesn't really matter what color I wear) I have a name tag that Identifies me clearly, and I always introduce myself as a nurse. Basic nursing courtesy. I do most of the hands on care as well as assessment of my patients. They know me, I make sure of it. Damn sure.

The author clearly states her intent is NOT to tell nurses what to wear. Don't get me wrong. I do understand what she's trying to say. Patients want to know who is providing care, and when.

To quote a line; "personal comfort vs. professional credibility, Individuality versus regimentation. Style (appearance) versus substance (nursing skill and knowledge)"
I personally don't wear little doggies, dolphins or cartoon characters or patterns of any kind on my scrubs. But that's my choice. I also don't pay a lot of money for a "uniform" that gets some of the substances mine get on them.

So browsing through the journal, mildly irritated and not really knowing why at first, later on there is an article called "Cultivating Personal Courage". This one outlines how nursing gets caught up in the "victim mentality" and how "we become angry, burned out, underappreciated, overworked" It was an ok, how-to feel-good-about-yourself, short article.

And I'm thinking, yeah, add a white uniform to that shit.

So the gist of my irritation was that as a feminist in a traditionally female profession is that there still is a NEED to cultivate respect. That this "women's job" is still devalued enough that we NEED clear identifiers via clothing. That-- let me face it, since I'm the one with the problem with it-- Women evidently, NEED an article to "Cultivate Courage" Jesus, the most profoundly courageous women I've know in my life have been nurses.


The article on Courage has an interesting question as a subtopic title;
"Where Does Courage End?"

[Warpy]

1. My last job was at a hospital where management decided that

everyone needed to wear distinct uniforms because the CEO's mother said she couldn't tell the nurses from the housekeeping staff. Never mind the housekeepers were wheeling a mop cart around and nurses had stethoscopes, the old bag just didn't like the informality of scrubs.

They offered a vote. Doctors wanted us all in starchy white dresses, like porno fantasies. Management said we could wear starchy white slacks. We all threatened to quit. There was eventually a compromise.

White is something only an ivory tower management type could possibly love. I wore it for years when I had no choice. It was hell to keep clean, and it was miserable to ride public transit home at night covered with blood and worse because everything was most obvious on a white uniform.

One hospital I worked for years ago experimented with dropping the dress code completely. Nurses who wore street clothes with lab coats noticed an immediate increase in the respect they got. Nurses who wore white got the least respect. Nurses in scrubs and lab coats were close to those in street clothes in terms of the respect they got from patients and doctors.

The absolute worst thing management can do is play dressup with their nurses. They always pick the wrong damned thing and the nurses end up humiliated and resentful. Add that to the brutal working conditions and you get a nursing shortage.

And for the record, I never had any use for AJN. It was too management centered and always hostile to those of us in the trenches.

[KitSileya]

5. That absolutely surprises me.

Not the color or anything, but that nurses have to pay for their own uniforms, and even worse, have to clean them themselves. In Norwegian hospitals, all staff are issued clothing - a white top and white pants, or a white lab coat, or all three, blue for NICU, green for operating theathers - from automatic dispensers by using their ID cards. Sizes are registered on your card - 6 possible sizes from small to XXXL - but you have to get maternity tops should you need that from a central depot. All staff have access to locker rooms to change. Nurses and orderlies, doctors and tech staff all wear the same clothes, except doctors usually also wear lab coats. The clothes are dumped in big automated hampers, again by swiping ID card to register the delivery, and then the hospital cleans the clothes. It's the only way the hospital feels they can be sure the clothers are washed at the requisite 82 degrees celsius. Having hospital staff travelling in their uniform before and after shifts - absolutely not. They even have to wear hospital issued t-shirts if the weather turns too hot in summers - no taking t-shirt from home.

[Warpy]

6. You have national healthcare

We have a very bad patchwork system of corporate health care that abuses everyone, staff and patients, to make an extra dollar.

Now we have MRSA in the community, undoubtedly tracked out of the hospital by doctors, nurses and other personnel who have nowhere to change into street clothing and who must wear soiled hospital clothing home.

It's hideous. It's the United States.

[KitSileya]

7. Yeah, that explains it, I guess. n/t

[bliss_eternal]

2. I was a waitress...

for a restaurant that insisted on uniforms that mimicked former nursing uniforms--white dress, hose and white shoes. Over the white dress we wore ugly jersey smock, apron thingies. :eyes: The owner of the restaurant was a sexist, racist pig, and his daughter not much better. They didn't even care that our uniforms got filthy on a daily basis. He just wanted his nurse porn fantasy on parade.

I'll be honest in that I was a very different person then, and turned a part of myself off in order to do things I couldn't possibly do now--like work as a waitress for such abusive bosses. Honestly, I don't think I could even be a restaurant server anymore either--but I digress. :P

A real eye opener for me was when I visited different branches of the same franchise, after leaving that job.

I found that the other locations employed MALE AND female servers--not just women. The place I worked only hired women as servers...:eyes: The other locations in the franchise allowed the servers to wear jeans or khakis with polo shirts (adorned w/the company emblem), with waist or full aprons. They also wore work boots or athletic walking shoes, like Reeboks.

Such a uniform is far less sexist, and allows for the movement of serving in a restaurant (i.e. bending, stooping, carrying plates of food, heavy trays, etc.) without (ahem) compromising one's self, so to speak. :blush:

I can't tell you how many cuts, scrapes, burns, etc. I experienced with those flimsy, white, piece of shit outfits they called uniforms. Not to mention all the times I caught pervs dropping shit trying to get me to bend over to pick it up so they could peek up the skirt... or the ones that didn't even bother to try to be subtle and stared at my legs the entire time I took their order. :puke:

[ismnotwasm]

3. Now I'm definetly writing a letter

I forgot about the ingrained porn image with nurses in white. I was thinking more on the lines of how it was a step back for nursing as a profession to be required to wear white, or indeed any "uniform" that screams look at me, I'm a nurse.

I'm going to enjoy writing this letter and I thank both of you for your imput.

[bliss_eternal]

4. Let us know how it goes...

:hi: Having worked in healthcare previously, I know it's sometimes an uphill battle. Even the women doctors don't get how they are upholding ridiculous standards of patriarchy within the male, medical model--but many do.

A few friends that still work in the medical field shared with me that in their experience, sometimes the women apologists are worse to work with and for than the male sexists. Go figure.

My issue with one female doc I worked with was she had a tendency to undermine the professionalism of the staff. She also was presumptious and arrogant, and seemed to assume none of us were as smart or as capable as she was, (I guess because she finished med school :eyes:) and tended toward being condescending, etc. It made me sad, as I (erroneously)thought, "...great a woman doctor that will be so wonderful, helping a woman's practice be a success." The assumption being working with and for a woman would be better than with the men, but it wasn't. In some ways it was more frustrating, because I made the assumption a woman would be better, more understanding, wouldn't do the crap the men do, etc.

Sorry, didn't mean to go off topic or on a weird tangent.

Good luck and please do let us know how it turns out! :)