I Respect Nurses

In response to a recent post I made, Anonymous has left a comment. Anonymous seems to think that my post indicated that I (or RT's in general) have no respect for nurses. I've carefully re-read my post and see nothing disrespectful of nursing. I do see that I have disdain for those who recognize only nursing as a qualified medical profession. Pointing out the error of thinking that any job title with the word nurse in it is synonymous with competent, educated, compassionate patient care does not indicate disrespect and I will not back down on that.

That said, let me tell you how I feel about nurses and nursing as a profession. Nurses are my right hand, they are an integral part of the patient care team. Did everyone pick up on that? TEAM! I start almost every shift here at Shoreline Medical by stopping at the nursing station and asking the charge nurse on the medical floor; "Who are WE concerned about today? Anyone WE need to keep OUR eye on?".

Then on to the surgical floor, "Good morning Charge Nurse, anyone WE are worried about on your floor? What about surgeries, anything that WE are going to need to be expecting trouble from?" Then on to CCU, same thing.

Yes I can and do look at the charts, but I want to hear what the nurses have to say, they are the ones who are with the patient eight, ten, twelve hours each day and "gut" instinct does not transfer well with today's computerized charting. I wish I had a dime for every time a good nurse paged me to help assess a patient that he/she just didn't seem quite right. I love 'em!

And when I'm out doing the work that I am here to do, I communicate, communicate, communicate. I value my nursing staff, my nursing assistant staff, and all other direct and non direct patient care staff that I work with. We are all here to do the same job, give good compassionate competent patient care, and advocate for the patient. I also respect and value the physicians, of which I am not and do not pretend to be. As the old saw goes, "sure I like nurses, some of them are my friends".

And so Anonoymous, I started my nursing program in 1966, when did you start yours?

Before the hew and cry starts, no I am not a nurse. I decided I did not like a couple of things about nursing. I did not like working in one area every shift, and I do not like POOP! Thankyou, Jane