What do you think/feel when someone tells you they are a nurse?
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Anonymous
| Do they have to work 12 hour shifts at the hospital? If yes, then why? I wouldn't be able to work that long. |
Anonymous
I'm in Canada. It did not exist here. |
Anonymous
I work at a desk job, we have the option of 8 and 12 hour shifts. I work PT and do the 8s. I am thinking of switching to 12s. My coworker works half time and does the 12 hour shifts. She works 3 days every two weeks! I want to switch. |
Anonymous
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How about when you hear that I am a nurse who works at home and/or a corporate office setting dealing with clinical insurance issues?
Raises or lowers initial opinion? |
Anonymous
Not a nurse but I used to be in the medical field. I LOVED 12 hr shifts and wish that I could go back to them. |
Anonymous
Medical training is a long haul -- you spend your 20s and early 30s working all the time and living a very one-dimensional life. Not everyone wants to do that. And not everyone is driven by money or by prestige. |
Anonymous
I didn't become a doctor, pharmacist, or some other "better respected/paid health care professional" because I didn't want to spend my 20s in school, accumulating a mountain of student loan debt. I am a master's-prepared RN and have the ability to become a NP/CRNA if I decide to do so in the future. Where I work, NPs and PAs are considered the same (advanced practice clinicians) and CNRAs handle most of the surgeries. |
Anonymous
+1 |
Anonymous
My cousin is a nurse who works 12-hour shifts -- in other words, she has a 3-day work week. She and her husband don't have kids yet and this is perfect for her. She gets to pursue other interests -- gardening, hiking and skiing, and is free to travel a lot. |
Anonymous
They're really different jobs. Pharmacists do not do a lot of patient care, for example. They consult on medication and have to know a ton about that and often know better about medications than doctors, but in terms of patient care, that's not what they're doing. Doctors do patient care, but it's higher level care. Most doctors do not do intake work or really get to know their patients beyond the presenting problem. If a person wants to do direct patient care, that person should go into nursing. |
Anonymous
+1 Pharmacists almost never see the patient unless they participate in rounds (which happens maybe once a week, tops). They're usually hanging out in the bowels of the hospital, fielding phone calls from clinicians about dosing/med compatibility/drug of choice and nurses frustrated because ordered medications haven't yet been approved or delivered. Pharmacy sends techs to the units to deliver medications and act like it's an inconvenience to cross the threshold into a patient's room when they're delivering something emergent or heavy (like dialysis bags). Some doctors never lay hands on the patient and rely on the nurse to tell them everything they write in a progress note. I work in critical care and both the bedside RN and the midlevel (PA or NP) do assessments, which are the basis for the physician's plan of care. So many patients have surgery and are puzzled they never see their doctor. It's because the surgeons usually breeze through the unit in street clothes, ask the midlevels and nurses a few questions, then they write notes and leave without ever seeing the patient. |
Anonymous
Yes we do 12s at the hospital (3), or if you are part-time you can do two 12s. I am PRN so I do two 12s in one month, but can pick up 8 hour shifts or even 12s if needed. Believe it or not, the 12 hours fly by. In fact, I found that my previous 8 hour (5 days) office work (first career) would go by ever so slowly. A 12 hour shift, at least on my floor, is never slow. |
Anonymous
| Respect and appreciation |
Anonymous
You sound pretty ignorant, CRNAs make 3 times what PAs make in many areas and are well respected. Also, not all nurses have to ask for urine, there are research nurses, informatic nurses, and many others. |
Anonymous
I also think that nurses are almost as defensive as teachers. |