<p>If you think there is a problem with image for nursing, you would be more than shocked at the situation of medical laboratory technologists. Medical labs have become large and complex with a mix of sophisticated automated analyzers and manual operations requiring knowledge, skill and care. The med techs have been at the absolute bottom of the pile. There are a couple of obvious reasons: laboratories are viewed as cost centers and med techs do not interact with patients. The field is so poorly paid and undesirable that very few employees have entered the workforce in over 20 years. Automation has helped to compensate, but those days are coming to an end. Testing keeps growing in quantity and complexity and the old techs are starting to retire. In some parts of the country there is now about a 20% shortage of trained techs. You would think supply and demand would take over, but I doubt that will ever happen. Hospitals have no money to spend on the labs. Nursing salaries and benefits have gone up very well when compared with the lab employees.</p>
<p>“That being said…i still would want to know why someone would rather be a nurse than a doctor if he/she has the financial and mental abilities to become one?”</p>
<p>The work of physicians and nurses are totally different. I wanted to provide not only medical care but care of the whole person. I work in OB-here are two examples of the differences.
- I spend a 12 hour shift with a woman in labor. I am giving her support and comfort, assessing her and her yet unborn baby. I teach her, I interact with her whole family. I also do procedures and interventions when things aren’t going well. I help her push sometimes for hours. The doctor is usually only with her for less than one hour of that time, sometimes minutes. While I am fully aware of the physicians responsibilities and skills, I want to be with the patient. My set of skills is totally different from the physicians.
- A mom comes in and her baby has died before birth. The physician does the ultrasound and gives her the horrible news. I stay with the patient and her husband for the next several hours, comforting them, answering questions. There are very few physicians who I work with who are comfortable spending more than 10 minutes with these patients. I feel I am giving them something out of the realm of the physician.</p>
<p>It is the idea that nurses are the physician’s helpers or merely doing tasks that needs to be dispelled. I did a research paper in which I evaluated over 2,000 portrayals of nurses in film. Only 50 were positive.</p>
<p>of course nurses arent the physician’s helpers…thats what PAs are for.</p>
<p>haha.</p>
<p>I dont know. Ive been both physicians and nurses be at both ends of the spectrum in terms of care for the patient so I guess it just depends on the staff at the hospital.</p>
<p>" I was overwhelmed by the resposibilities I was given straight out of nursing school (on an understaffed surgical floor)."</p>
<p>This is why I am no longer working in the field. I got my degree at 20 and I was a teeny-tiny little girl (4’11, 90 pounds), very idealistic. I worked in an excellent rehab facility and did good work. Unfortunately, I was in charge of about 40 employees and 65 patients 24 hours a day, and the unions chewed me up and spit me out.</p>
<p>mini: A nurse’s undergrad costs are the same as a doctor’s. Your wife must be at an unusually inexpensive school. Or going for an associate degree, which will be very limiting for her career advancement. If $$$ is the motivator, stay out of nursing. While salaries have risen due to the current shortage, it is not a high paying field when you weigh the tremendous responsibility a nurse carries each day. Her license is on the line with every decision & action she takes, and she is often placed in unreasonable & dangerous situations. A doctor will always earn more than a nurse. Most toll collectors on the highways make more. There are loads of opportunities for doctors to practice where no responsibilities for setting up a private practice exist. </p>
<p>Read Keymom’s reasons for choosing a nursing career if you want to understand the decision. The careers are completely different in focus and temperament. A great deal of a nurse’s duties are performed away from the bedside, so the general public may be unaware of the multitasking the job requires. I wouldn’t want to be cared for by a nurse who chose the field for the paycheck.</p>
<p>I too am a nurse, could have gone to med school, but I prefer my role–
I have flexible hours and was able to be home with my kids when they were young. My work is interesting and I am challenged every day.</p>
<p>I work as a true partner with my physician colleagues. We bring a different skill set to the table when it comes to patient care. I work in a tertiary care hospital with chronically ill kids–I focus on patient/family education, adjustment to illness–my doc colleagues work on diagnosis and treatment. We work as a team—separate but equal.</p>
<p>Those who feel if a nurse was smart enough he/she would have become a doctor are sorely misinformed. I graduated magna cum laude from a top LAC and then went on to nursing school and graduated with a 4.0. I would not trade my career for anyother and I would encourage my sons to consider nursing as a career.</p>
<p>By the way, I also make 120K per year plus fabulous benefits—not too shabby for a career that I love</p>
<p>Hallelujah Edad, I honestly don’t know what we are going to do for med techs in the future, and as you said automation and hiring less qualified people only goes so far. We also have a problem with the work ethic of younger hires - not only are some of them not interested in working AS hard as our older techs, some of them don’t seem to have any concept of working at all - it is really wierd, and developed in the last couple of years.</p>
<p>I have a little different take on nurses - there are some wonderful, bright hard-working nurses, and a lot of them get bumped up or out (or burned out) from the floor jobs where they can do so much good. Many of our floor nurses are new hires or short timers, who get tossed out on the floor with limited exposure to the SOPs of the hospital - it can get really old dealing with them on a daily basis, particularly if they are resistant to learning the way things are done. I don’t know what the answer is, all hospital services are in such a tremendous financial squeeze, although you wouldn’t believe it looking at the cost of health care. Hospitals have to hire who they can get, and not all are bright, well-trained nurses, but they often give the strong nurses a bad rep.</p>
<p>Nurses are the backbone of the medical profession. I do not think that nursing is truly appreciated by some, nor compensated as it should be. I worked in our trauma unit for several years and there isn’t any amount of money paid that will compensate when you loose a patient that you worked so hard to save or see one come back to visit that you didn’t think would make it. </p>
<p>Support your local nurses this week, they could use a thank you!</p>
<p>I would not trade my career for anyother and I would encourage my sons to consider nursing as a career.
When D was in NICU for 8 weeks, I was there 14 hrs a day for 8 weeks- not so much at the end, although I was there every day, but I got to know the nurses and other parents pretty well.
Really all the nurses she had were great, and the docs ( it was a university teaching hospital) relied on them quite a bit. She also had some very good male nurses ( however- with the tiny babies- physical strenght is not needed so much- male nurses often go into fields where their upper body strenght is more needed).
When younger D was born- term VBAC at same hospital- I admit I was floored when she had to also be in the NICU- but even though she was 8 years younger- she had the same nurse that her sister had!
It was horrifying- yet pretty cool at the same time ( horrifying mainly because younger D had same nurse- same area in ward & it brought up memories of a very scary intense time- even though she was healthy and term)
but if I had boys and they were interested in health care toward the disbursing end, I would suggest nursing to them.
I have considered it myself, but I am not so good at following directions 
My sister in law finds it very rewardng though, and her daughter is also studying nursing at UIndiana- Bloomington</p>
<p>Also I wondered after posting how many of you that are nurses have encouraged your children to follow into the profession?</p>
<p>I have 2 boys who can’t stand the sight of blood and get squeamish at the thought of sticking a needle in someone. So the idea of any kind of medical career has always been immediately dismissed but they both love to watch “House”.</p>
<p>I would love to have House’s job…figuring out the diseases without having to cut open people’s bodies.</p>
<p>Id love the challenges and such.</p>
<p>I encouraged my second son. The others are not medically inclined</p>
<p>As for encouraging my kids to become nurses: I’m neutral. I doubt my kids would be so inclined. My daughter is grossed out by loading dirty dishes into the dishwasher. I highly doubt she’d be able to handle the “grubby” side of nursing. She’s a warm person with great science ability, though. Who knows. My son has already decided to be an engineer like his dad.</p>
<p>I would certainly present both the pros & cons. Then I’d have them talk to my many friends who practice nursing in a wide variety of settings. An RN is quite a valuable credential in a number of fields, so one is not bound to patient care if that is not one’s dream careeer.</p>
<p>I have a snooty sister-in-law who was introduced to my best friend years ago. When s-i-l asked her what she did and my friend replied, “I’m a nurse,” s-i-l literally turned away & started talking to someone else! Later in the course of the day, when s-i-l learned my friend was the president of a hospice w/multiple advanced degrees, she said, “Oh, you’re much more than just a nurse.” To which my friend replied, “Being a nurse is what I’m proudest of.” (Cue the sappy violin music.) </p>
<p>House is a compelling character, but the show is maddening. The residents perform nursing duties, and any nurses are seen as ineffective or downright dense. ER used to drive me nuts, too. When I worked the night shift, I usually didn’t have time for a bathroom break. No time for loud dance parties on the units, love affairs blossoming, or anything other than working like a dog.</p>
<p>I am a physician.</p>
<p>I tried to convince my daughter to go into nursing.</p>
<p>Enough said.</p>
<p>Nurses in HI can earn about as much (sometimes more) than many docs, particularly when you consider overtime. They can bring in over $100,000/year, generally don’t have to get their own malpractice insurance, and can generally practice anywhere in the US (unlike docs who have to take exams if they want to practice in another state). There are many options for nurses–some docs offices, hospitals, insurers, home health care, geriatrics, etc.</p>
<p>It is unfortunate that they aren’t given the prestige that many associate with docs, but many of my friends are nurses & have advanced to administrative positions where they have a lot more control over their hours & working conditions. It is a tough, very demanding field, but a great nurse is truly invaluable for patients & their loved ones. When you or a loved one is in the hospital, it is the nurse that is the link & contact, not the doc who breezes in & out in 5 minutes or less.
I salute all our wonderful nurses. My kids are too squeamish to be docs or nurses & don’t have the stamina for the medical or nursing professions.
PAs are another great field that nurses are filling.</p>
<p>Part of the reason nurses seem to have less respect is frankly we are still primarily a woman’s profession and sexism does still reign in our society. In addition, we are one of a few professions where many work as “employees” of large institutions (not unlike teachers) thus we may appear less independent as compared to other professions</p>
<p>The media contributes to the stereotypes about nursing as well.
When was the last time you saw a movie entitled “Naughty Doctors”? well you will see movies with that sort of inference in reference to nurses.</p>
<p>The nurses I work with are bright and well educated–hailing from such notable schools as Penn, Boston College, Boston University, Case Western, UCSF. Some in my office have their MPHs from Harvard.
We are smart and we are capable. We earn terrific salaries and have flexible schedules and work closely with bright people in other professions–medical doctors, social workers, nutritionists. The work is challenging and rewarding.</p>
<p>None of us take call or work weekends in my office. We all make well over $120,000 per year (based on full time status)</p>
<p>Most of us paid our dues for a few years working nights and weekends, but have worked our way up the ladder so that is no longer necessary</p>
<p>Nursing is career any young person would be wise to consider</p>
<p>Let me weigh in with a surgeon’s view point (and possibly that of other procedure oriented specialists where the doctor is absent from the ward for most of the day):
- We cannot function without nurses.
- Nurses provide the continuity of care to the hospitalized patient. We simply cannot be there with our patients more than a few minutes each day.
- RNs perform many of the funcitons formerly done by physicians in addition to the TLC. They keep the ICU patients alive for instance and make many medical assessments. They spot developments long before surgeons do because the nurses are there at the instant something significant happens and they have prolonged exposure to that patients and can notice subtle differences.
Anyone who has tried to function during a nursing shortage can tell you how essential they are.
Just a side note on MDs with a condescending attitude toward nurses: these are often female MDs. I haven’t quite figured out why.</p>
<p>even though nursing school is not quite as rigourous as medical school,( or demanding in a slightly diff way) you still need a solid background in science and math- two subjects which many schools don’t teach well.</p>