Nursing

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Additional Information

(1) What’s Really Bad About Nursing?

After watching my “Nursing Work Sucks…” video someone commented on YouTube that I had sugar-coated what nursing was really like. I replied with the following 500 character (maximum allowed) response:

“OK my title was an attention grabber, so maybe it looks like I sugar-coated things, but I didn’t set out to totally put people off becoming a nurse, and it’s the only career I still work in part-time so I do get satisfaction there. However after your comment I made a quick list of what nurses don’t like about the job, in effect stripping away the glossy bits, and it explains why nurses can burn out.”

So, in contrast to my actual video, realize that I could have spent the 10 minutes only complaining about ALL the bad points, and for starters it would comprise a list like this:

  • the unrelenting stress that many nurses continuously feel under;
  • the mad scramble to keep up with all the tasks so that sometimes you don’t even get proper breaks;
  • the bitchiness you sometimes find among staff;
  • the pressure from managers and the nurse in-charge of the shift;
  • the challenge of dealing with demanding patients (they know who they are) that wear you down;
  • the school-like environment where somebody’s always watching to see whether you do something wrong, and if you do they can make you feel terrible;
  • the technically difficult tasks we often perform – getting an IV in an obese person for example, or simultaneously juggling 6 or more different IV infusions – PLUS the numbers on the monitor and the ventilator machine – in a very sick ICU patient;
  • not to mention the totally chaotic environment that ED nurses work within;
  • contrast that with the boredom of some types of repetitive ICU nursing;
  • the emotional drain of watching patients slowly die, as in cancer nursing – soon after I started I once was horrified to see ALL the staff crying which to me lacked professionalism;
  • the heavy lifting tasks that we often face, despite facility “no-lift” policies;
  • the never-ending paperwork;
  • the sometimes unreasonable demands from doctors;
  • negative effects on our health from a lack of proper sleep;
  • the ever present risk we face from getting MRSA or VRE or hep C or HIV or swine flu;
  • and that we’re often far too busy to properly engage with patients on a human level;
  • the list goes on and on.

There you go, now I’ve stripped away the glossy bits, and you see why nurses can often burn out.

So now answer this: Why do we do it?

Or: What personal qualities make truly dedicated nurses such standouts?

Perhaps those are better topics for a video?
– Stew

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