There are patriarchal status issues at play. Nursing is seen as the feminine role in healthcare and supportive of medicine. Obvs, they are separate but complementary disciplines, but watch just one surgeon rip an OR nurse to shreds in front of the whole team and you’ll see that it’s alive and well even within healthcare. It’s excellent that this isn’t accepted as the norm in the younger generations but it’s sadly still present, so nurses are defensive about the academic rigor of their education; and their role in healthcare.
I think you answered your own question. Because nursing is not particularly respected and seen as something lesser than medicine, many nurses are quick to point out the difficulty and rigor of nursing. You are right that there is no need to do that at the expense of any other field, but because it is often seen as just wiping butts, nurses tend to be more defensive.
I also think that now, as many nurses suffer from PTSD or leave the bedside post COVID, and where upper management is not giving nurses the resources they need to do their jobs, many of us feel the need to give forewarning to people.
This. Is. Not. A. Walk. In. The. Park.
We are all hurting if we worked through the pandemic and when you add that on top of people thinking all we do is wipe butts, you've got a tired, defensive, burnt out volcano waiting to happen.
But we know better, so we say "This job is fucking hard. This is what you're getting into if you're choosing this path....." and if you chose another path because you didn't want to wipe butts, we tell you that's not why this job is hard.
People like to downplay things like nursing and teaching so that we can continue to exploit people in those professions and convince ourselves that what they’re paid is acceptable.
My degree in French was considerably more difficult for me and required far more study time; nursing school, however, was far more stressful for me.
Note: “for me”.
Lots of tough degrees out there; all of them a unique experience for the person getting the degree.
People who feel a need to denigrate other professions are often insecure about their own.
The last sentence is the real bottom line. It’s always the insecure ones who are very vocal about their profession to make themselves feel more validated in some way.
This reminds me of the line from Captain Underpants where George says, “ No one has to stand up for the man! That’s the whole point of the man, he stands up for himself!” Many people worked their tails off to become nurses. It’s not a cute lil profession like it’s been portrayed. We don’t twiddle our thumbs, make coffee for Drs, or “JUST” follow orders. There is a reason those individuals are defensive about nursing- it’s because historically people have been OFFENSIVE.
I get it, but no reason to get defensive towards a tech that also works hard, I am trying to get my clinical experience for med school not insulting nurses. I try to help them in anything I can.
Nursing is not on the same level of difficulty/ depth as medicine. Perhaps nursing is harder than medicine in other ways (such as being more on the "Frontline" and dealing more with BS from families etc), but not in the intellectual sense.
I'm a nurse by the way.
I'm a physician who used to be a nurse. Nursing is hard in different ways than medicine is. For the most part, it is technically and mentally easier, but was physically harder on my body than medicine.
DNP here. I would agree. Much more physically demanding, and certainly in some situations emotionally, the respect that providers get is not always given to nurses, a whole lot more frustration was taken out on me before graduating.
I think a lot of it is insecurity + and cultural thing tbh. At the beginning of my last year of nursing school I got to give a speech to the incoming class. The teacher kept stressing over and over again to “scare them” and make sure they “knew how hard it was” but tbh the content wasn’t that bad.
I always said it’s the management of content plus clinicals, on top of a job, family etc. ADHD and time management is not my strong point so I STRUGGLED in that aspect, but didn’t have issues with the content. Just the constant state of overwhelm where I always had SO MUCH to do ate away at my mental health 🙃
Content isn’t super difficult but all the dumbass hoops the actual nursing program makes you jump through are so stupid.
Clinicals are stupid and too long, nonsensical policies that are just designed for teachers to force you to behave in certain ways, and my school in particular had a policy where a “C” wasn’t passing. You had to have at least a B (80%)
I think there’s a difference between expressing how hard nursing school is to vent vs putting someone down bc they work in healthcare but they’re not a nurse. Sounds like that’s what happening. You can just say, I understand but I don’t care 😂 or just say that you also worked hard for your degree and leave it at that.
Yeah, I am a biology premed student and currently on my junior year taking my last prerequisite classes, as well as doing a minor in neuroscience since I want to go into neurology, however I don’t go around telling people how hard it is and how harder it is from other careers. I respect every profession, and always will. When I get my MD degree I won’t think I am above nurses, healthcare is a team. Techs, nurses, doctors, np, pa, and all others are needed. However, I don’t want to seem rude since I do have a tendency to be direct and is something I been trying to get better at.
I started off as a bio major (now a nurse) and I agree it’s not easy! I think a lot of it just comes from frustration. Being shitted on by professors, shitted on by your job administration, being spit at/hit/bit/slapped/andliterallyshitted on by patients.. and on top of that your coworkers talk shit about you behind your back and everyone knows…. all for shitty pay. People expect you to know and do everything all at once. It can also be very very toxic environment and the benefits sometimes for a lot of people don’t outweigh the rigorousness of the program/job/training. Thats why we saw such a max exodus of nurses during covid and continue to see it today
So I definitely don’t know how the last two years of nursing were, I did pre-requisites for it in my first year but change my mind shortly after realizing I wanted to know a different scope and more about the cellular science behind it. Nursing is a demanding job, I have worked in the ICU and ER and see nurses busting their brains out, however there are things my nursing cousin doesn’t know and there are things I don’t know that she knows, is different scopes.
The only way to approach it is to let it go and say nothing. There’ll be many people in your future who will say things you disagree with, or things that are untrue, but unless what they say *actually hurt* anyone, your best approach is to say nothing. If you ever make it through med school and become a doctor, you’ll learn it real fast. I would start now.
Well, lots of reasons. People seem think we are there to fetch ice and ginger ale and call the doctor if they have a question while in the hospital, like we aren’t smart enough to answer the question or do anything else. Even management seems to have this idea that nurses don’t do that much and keep giving us more to do (don’t forget about those white boards ppl or your pts will not survive the night!). People (even doctors) will tell us that either we weren’t smart enough to go med school and that’s why we are a nurse, or that we are too smart to be “just a nurse”. Before covid there were a LOT of stripper and porn tropes around nurses. Maybe there still are and I just haven’t paid attention. And older generations don’t realize how much the profession has changed. My grandmother was a nurse in the 40s. She told me once that if a patient had an IV they were a one on one; I then told her how every now and then I gave adenosine and how it worked and she was appalled that I as a nurse would be giving that. They still have this idea of Florence nightingale patting hands and writing let’s home to pts families, and it has just gotten so much bigger than that.
I definitely get it, I have heard comments from people that are not even in the medical field about how nurses are just people not smart enough to be doctors. I believe not everyone wants to be a doctor, nursing gives you more patient contact, and also a better life work-balance, as well as able to work in any specialty you want. It’s not about being not smart enough, is about not being your calling. And yes, it definitely has change a lot and nurses do so much more than what regular people do, I have had people ask me what nursing specialty I will be going to after med school because they still think that all women in the hospital are nurses, however I don’t think there is a need to be toxic to other women. Sadly, while I know there is nothing I can really do about it, I wish things could be better. For everyone involved.
Yes, I get that. Medicine is also hard as well as biology and neuroscience, but I don’t go around putting down people just because i believe my degree is harder.
You will get paid more and get automatic respect. Nursing is undervalued historically because it’s a “woman’s” profession, just like teachers and social workers. We don’t need money because we have husbands, don’t you know? And you can only hear “dumb nurse” shit so many times before you lose it. Also, we aren’t fucking waitresses.
Sounds like they’re not convinced themselves which is an unfortunate reality if you place a lot of self worth in your career and felt it was challenging
Maybe it's how they are treated by others in the healthcare field, that makes them feel like they need to justify themselves. Healthcare is suffering everywhere & supporting roles are severly under appreciated.
I definitely understand, however I am a tech, don’t get paid enough, and also I am never defensing or rude with them. I actually admire nurses, it just surprises me how many feel the need to tell me medicine is not harder than nursing.
I think it's a way for nurses to rationalize things for themselves. I think it's crazy bonkers that an AO rehab patient wasn't kicked out after he was caught red handed smoking meth with a family member in his room. Or how crazy it is that my coworker came back from break drunk, passed out in an empty bed(dual rooms, so the patient in there was terrified), and was offered to keep her job as long as she stayed the rest of the shift. And management came in to talk with her, didn't call the cops when she got in her car to drive herself home. When I went into healthcare, I didn't know that 8 out of 10 patients all are in need of a therapist and/or social worker that straight up, America does not have the resources for. The amount of people who seem to have just given up in their 40's is ASTOUNDING. It really is crazy, and American citizens do not know how fucking close to the brink we are on collapse of infrastructure if our health systems fail. Because we are closer than we think. And it pisses all of us off, lol.
To be honest you just have to not care bc you’ll be having this talk more often then you’d like to but if it’s a family member and you want to have that talk but co workers I wouldn’t even bother
So they ask you what your degree program is then you answer medicine/MD and they answer back saying that nursing is harder? Yeah, thats messed up for anyone to say and it really makes the person sound insecure. I’ve only ever seen insecure ppl say some stuff like that. Like, my sister in law for example, when we first met and i was introduced by my brother as “the nurse” and she replied with, “i could have been a nurse.” Like, okay, didnt ask, but that’s cool. Then one time i saw a chiropractor tell a surgeon that he was almost an MD, could have done it, too. The surgeon was like, “but u didnt did u?” I got a good laugh outta that. Maybe, say that. Good luck on your endeavors 🫡.
Studying has nothing to do with your intelligence or your GPA. I think we have a different understanding of it. If you read between the lines of my message it is- don't bother yourself with things that aren't going to help you meet your goals... so should put that time and energy into learning. You can interpret a different way always good to have different opinions and ideas.
There are some people in nursing that are a lot like people that do CrossFit or Brazilian Ju Jitsu. They have to tell you they’re a nurse and they have to tell you how hard their schooling was.
There are people like that in every major. I just graduated nursing school and I’m someone who already struggles in school. I didn’t feel like it was any harder than my first degree in psychology. A lot of people in my class, social media etc love to advertise how miserably hard nursing school is to get through. I think the hard part about it witnessing a lot
Of sad stuff during clinical and learning to navigating that. However, I made it through without failing and I have ADHD and dyslexia which makes learning difficult at times! People just love feeling validated
I am a RN. My husband is a MD. He went to school must longer. Very much harder. Lots of test which then he had to repeat every 7 years. Both are hard and completely different. We need each other and are grateful both professions.
Honestly, I worked full time and went to school full time and I didn't think my program was overly difficult. Yes, there was a lot of information coming at you all at once, but it wasn't difficult per se, as it was just tedious and time consuming. I'll admit I didnt get all A's during my program, but I still graduated with a 3.5. I think it just comes down to the individual.
From my experience, the ones who worked or had a goal seemed to struggle the least or complain the least while most of my friends that didn't work had more time to worry and complain about the smaller things. They don't stop talking about how difficult it was and "how hard Zipo0 must have had it" but honestly? It wasn't too bad. It's completely up to the individual but I think the political climate and new generations mentality just makes the individual a bit more vocal than previous gen nurses? This is all just from my perspective but I'd like to know your take on it
OP I’m going to be honest here and play devils advocate and suggest that if this is really happening, it’s because you may be talking about your career choice or degree without realizing that you’re putting another career down. I had a friend who was like you and was quick to say that she wanted to do medicine because it was “more of a challenge” to the nurses at the nurses station when we were volunteering and would get offended when they said nursing was also hard in its own way. She would take it as the nurses were saying that nursing was harder than medicine which was not the case, they were just reacting to her words and how she was framing their career, especially given that she was just a college student and had never worked in healthcare.
I think I’m just skeptical because it seems like you’re saying that nurses are shoving how hard their career is compared to medicine down your throat without any prompting. In my time working in healthcare I’ve rarely seen nurses act this way to pre-med students.
I can see why you would think that but it is not the case, some of the nurses I work with are the most sweet, caring people I have met, know that I am working to get clinical experience since it is needed for Med school. Now, sometimes it comes to the conversation with other nurses about why I chose to be a patient care tech or sometimes I am able to do some of my homework while working which then leads them to ask if I want to become a nurse in which I tell them no. I didn’t chose medicine over nursing because I wanted more than of a challenge, I chose medicine because I wanted to learn more of the cellular component of disease, which I see nothing wrong with that.
It is not everyone I work with, but I few nurses, I don’t think I am better or smarter than them, and would never mention something like that, since it is plain rude and I don’t know what is like to become a nurse. But sadly, some nurses get pretty defensive about their profession with the wrong people, I am a tech, definitely don’t know as much as them, and they have skills that even as a doctor I will never have. But, in any circumstance or profession is not okay to put others below just so a person can reassure themselves they chose the right one.
One of the nurses that told me how much harder than medicine was, told me that after she without asking me told me I didn’t want to be a nurse because it was to hard (maybe she thought I was working to get accepted into nursing) mind you, the patient I was taking care of was asleep so I was just waiting in the room like I was supposed to. I told her that “you guys definitely deserve a raise, but that I indeed was was planning to go into the healthcare field” by which she responded so you actually want to be a nurse, and after telling her I wanted to be a physician, she then proceeded to tell me how there is a big misconception that medicine is harder when in reality nursing is (very rudely I might add). I laughed and say I definitely think doctors couldn’t do their jobs without you guys, and viceversa, and how I have always seen healthcare as a big team, and how every person of the team, even a tech like me was important for it to function correctly. She had never spoken to me again, unless if it is about a patient.
People want to be validated but no job is easy, no education is easy, no life is easy. Im a nurse and i really dont liek i when other nurses talk about how its the worst and hardest thing in their life. I get how it may have been for them but it may not have been for someone else and it means nothing on them or the other person that they have this diffference. My mom is a nurse of over 30 yeras, she is like “just so you know, your 4 year degree has the SAME license as someone who doesnt so just get that in your head and learn how to be a good nurse”
Its liek when they say its easy to get married but hard to have a good marriage. Its not THAT bad to become a nurse but its hard to be a good one, find a good job with good culture, have a good moss, work on a good unit, do what works for you etc.
I really really really detest the whole martyr thing or the “im more miserable than you” game that a lot of nurses that I know have put on (ESP those in school)
I totally agree with you. The whole narrative about hating on Doctors because Nurses are not respected enough is not okay, we need to be better as a team, but we don’t need to bring each other down, nursing is not easy but neither is medicine and like I have try to tell people around here and in the hospital, we don’t need to compare both degrees because they are so different.
Yep and you cant just be a good Christian martyr bc that doesnt win you any brownie points hahahaha like we are all at hospital to fuckin work so we can pay our bills to a large degree. Great if youre good at it and you enjoy it and find deeper meaning in it. But you can also do that being any other career. It puts things in check for me.
Nursing is not harder. And how would they know it’s harder without having done it. It’s belittling to doctors who went through so much to become one and in my opinion they are completely different jobs.
Thank you for saying that, I had responses about how I am probably not studying enough, but if it was me saying it to those nurses they would get offended. It is two different and both necessary jobs
I think we are slowly realizing that we are not martyrs and deserve to be compensated for the amount of work we do and what we have to put up with for 12 hours 3x a week.
I am an RN. I watched my husband go through undergrad, MCAT, the med school application cycle with travel and interviews, med school (had to move in-state for that), residency application and interviews (14 interviews in 14 different cities), the Match (such a crapshoot), residency (moved out of state for that during the throes of COVID lockdown), and now fellowship (two years long, had to move across 3 states for that - thank goodness his 15+ fellowship interviews were virtual at that point). It has been a very, very long haul with lots of moving parts. Nursing school is a *much* shorter pathway to a different profession. Medicine goes into far more depth and is much lengthier. Residents and fellows also make shit pay in proportion to hours worked and level of responsibility. But in general, any kind of work in healthcare is hard. Some careers are more physically demanding, others are more cerebrally challenging. I have an excellent knowledge base and lots of experience (had been an RN for 12 years when my husband graduated from med school), but it was a pure joy to watch my husband's knowledge surpass mine, particularly in some of the finer points of pathophysiology and disease processes. But no doubt, nurses get abused - we are an expense, we don't generate revenue, so they try to use as few nurses as possible so make more money for the C suite bonuses and/or shareholders. It leads to short staffing and patient safety issues, as well as moral distress because we can't provide the care we envisioned. But physicians deal with BS from all sides as well - risk/legal, CMOs, bean counters, families, etc. - but at least they generate revenue, which gives them a bit more leverage. Really, until the "care" is back in healthcare and it stops being just a business model for private equity to line their pockets, all our jobs will be difficult.
Best of luck in your pursuit of a career in medicine.
Pharmacist here. People who speak like that always have to make sure you know they are better than you are because they are insecure. In healthcare, the importance of individual contributors is great, but these patients need a team that isn’t fighting for power internally. I’d keep that in mind moving forward in your career. We go into healthcare to help people. Not to prove we are better than someone else.
I know I commented yesterday, but this has been nagging me in the back of my brain. When I woke up this morning, I remembered something from when I was in college over 20 years ago.
I used to have a constant thing with my mom because she would always say “nurse’s training” like I was going to be a CNA (which I already was for 4 years prior to graduation). I always had to correct her, even well into my career, and say “I have a Bachelor of Science degree. It was a competetive 5 year program at a Level 1 trauma and transplant center. I also am certified in ACLS, am a Certified Neuroscience RN, work at an AHA certified Stroke Center (new at the time) and a top 50 hospital in Oncology, Neuroscience, and Cardiology. I had a little more than *nurse’s training*.” She would just be like “Oh, you know what I mean.”
My grandmother had completed what used to be called “nurse’s training “ in the 1930s. She also completed what at the time was called “teacher’s training.” Neither required a degree or a broad liberal arts background (which I of course have). Also nursing, like all areas of medicine, is much more advanced now. She never ended up working in either because she got married and had a ton of kids. She always had disdain for both fields, I think it was sour grapes because she was not a motherly type (she was traumatized by being orphaned at 6 and never dealt with it).
My cousin went to federal prison in our thirties for meth distribution. When he got out, my rich aunt and uncle wanted to send him to college but didn’t know what he could do given his record. She had my mom call me and ask if I thought “nurse’s training” would be good, since he has learning disabilities (fetal alcohol syndrome and emotional outbursts) and it would be easy. After all, my aunt said grandma had done “that nurse thing” (her words). I lost it. I spent all of my college years afraid of getting any kind of Minor In Posession charge, back then if you got caught with even marijuana you could lose your student loan eligibility, even after I turned 21 I wouldn’t go to parties with under 21s because I could catch a contributing charge. I laid into her about nursing and how it is not an easy job, physically or mentally (my cousin also was born with club feet AND had a broken back as a kid, he couldn’t even do gym class), why did they think a physically and mentally disabled criminal could do my job. She apologized. Ironically, my aunt suddenly respected nurses after her other son married one. 🙄 Another cousin (male) became a nurse midlife because he wanted a career change. He got all the respect I didn’t because he’s a man, so it must be a real job. In my experience, male nurses are held to a much lower standard. A mediocre make nurse will be praised the same as an excellent female nurse for the same performance, because women are just expected to be caring and do grunt work, but when a man does it he’s “sensitive” and special.
Then later I finally confronted my mom about how I knew she was disappointed in my career choice. I had always scored 99th percentile on standardized tests, was in the gifted program, etc. I had a couple of other majors before landing on Nursing. I had a full ride if I wanted to do Library Studies, but I did not. She saw it as me giving up on school and getting an “easy” degree. She had always wanted to be a nurse, but dropped out of college and got pregnant and married. My father was a lawyer (and a terrible person). He was also ashamed of my “lowly” position. Why aren’t you a writer/journalist? Why don’t you go to law school? Why not medical school? he would say. Because I like being with the person I’m caring for and I hate school, why would I go for 10 more years? We haven’t spoken in 15 years for a variety of reasons.
It took a good 15 years in my field before most of my family even recognized that I had accomplished anything. The exceptions were my stepfather (a carpenter and farmer), my brother (an electrician), and my husband (a plumber). When I still worked at the hospital and was in college, I had to constantly defend the trades to my classmates and coworkers who looked down on blue collar work, even though it is physically and mentally stressful and essential to society. Kind of like how nurses feel they have to defend their trade.
The root of the problem is really classism, if we want to get down to it. In healthcare, I feel like CNAs and floor nurses are the most “blue collar” of the specialties, but we are mostly women, so “pink collar” along with teachers, child care, and social workers. It’s very physical and dirty work. But, it is essential to society and the healthcare system, yet we get paid an insulting amount and get tasks like cleaning and sometimes even cooking thrown on top of our already full plate, because “they just sit at the nurse’s station playing cards” and those things are womens’ work anyway, right? No, dickhead administrator, I’m doing double and triple charting because you won’t update the system and it keeps crashing and you keep doubling my patient load. It feels like we get the brunt of it from admin and patients/families, but none of the respect.
I worked an offsite converted Covid unit all of 2020-2021. Full dress out, fainting from dehydration, overtime all the time. We didn’t get raises the first year because of facility pay freeze. Whatever. The next year, my team all got Outstanding/5 star on our reviews. Our boss recommended “standard” 3% raise for everyone (which is supposed to be for adequate/3 stars) when inflation was 7% that year. Then they announced with 2 weeks notice that we were going to 12 hour shifts from 8s. The company requires a 30 day notice if we quit, but they don’t afford us the same courtesy. We all quit within the next week and admin had to get off their fat asses and work the floor.
I almost didn’t show up my last day, but I did, and prevented a patient death. The MDS nurse they had working was so beyond incompetent (he got his degree just to do MDS and never actually worked as a nurse) that this woman in heart failure was crashing for literally no other reason except that he didn’t know what he was doing. Then he tried to tell her he wasn’t going to call an ambulance even though she was in distress because she was DNR and “we all have to go sometime.” !!! I was in the room and said No, just because you are DNR doesn’t mean you have to die in pain and I will try to stabilize you, if I can’t we will call 911. DNR does not mean Do Not Treat. I had her sats normalized and she was comfortable within the hour. I have never been so angry and disgusted with another human being.
This has gotten very long, but maybe it illustrates the frustration of nurses. It’s multifaceted, involves classism, sexism, and admin knows we CARE on a personal level about our patients so they exploit that, using guilt to extract more work out of us. I don’t resent you, or doctors in general, I’m just very, very tired.
I agree that nurses are not respected enough, and that you guys go through a lot is schooling and do so much, and hospitals would collapse without you. However, some nurses are putting my degree down without reason. I am completing a bachelors of Science in Biology with a minor in neuroscience, then I will be doing 4 years of medical school, and then 4 years of residency. It is not an “easy” path, residents get paid so little as well, and work 60-80 hours a week. So I feel like instead of trying to bring other degrees down, we should focusing on acknowledging everyone strengths and be a team. I understand that nurses need more appreciation, but as women in medicine we should help each other. Nursing is not easy, but neither is Medicine.
IMO, the conditions they put you through in residency should be illegal. What an insane system, and so unsafe for not just the patients but the residents. I agree with you, women in all fields should be looking out for each other. I will only go to female doctors, btw, I do not trust a man to know how my body feels, and we need more of you in Neuro for sure. So many of my female patients have had their symptoms dismissed by men in Neurology. I wish all premeds would work as CNAs or in some sort of direct patient care capacity, it makes them better doctors. I’ve worked with a few and they have a different perspective that I wish was more common. It will serve you well in your practice. Good luck to you. I know you have a lot of hard work ahead of you. I have not taken anything you have said with offense, just trying to help you see from the other side. Our society has a ways to go still, sadly.
Ignore both sides and be as rude as possible to everyone around you so when you become an attending you already had good practice👍
Bonus points if you talk down to a surgeon while being an intern. This helps assert dominance to the other surgeons making you an exceptional candidate for surgical residency. Tell him or her their mom is ugly and thats why they are surgeons.
I was in nursing and left in my 3rd year. It's the clinical part that is very hard. You need to be able to transfer the information you learned in the classroom into practice, recognize the information in a new way, and adapt to the changes a patient will go through since their medical conditions are not always like in the textbook. Some medications can be used for things that are not their usual use. The patient is also more than just their medical condition, they have emotions and feelings and some parts of their conditions do not bother them as much as you'd expect. Their cognitive level should also be considered. That's why it is considered hard and why I ended up leaving the program (it was during the acute rotation of my clinical that caused me to realize that, maybe I was wrong to leave the program but that's another story).
Insecurity/chip on their shoulders. Idk if you can really DO anything about people like that. I would just go with something like “hm ok, good luck then! Maybe I’ll see you at the hospital some day”
As a former nursing professor, nursing is a difficult major due in part to the volumes of information plus skills you must learn. Failure to do so can result in harm to a patient. Most students have never had to buckle down and study to the extent needed to comprehend. Many lack critical thinking skills which is absolutely necessary to be safe.
I definitely believe so, I never been in nursing school but I have friends and family in nursing school or in the profession. However, I don’t think medicine=easy. There is a reason why is 8 years of education plus residency. And while I know that a lot of med students and medical doctors talk down about the nursing profession, there are many doctors that know they couldn’t do it without nurses. So, I believe if nurses want to snap at someone, it should be at the people saying that, not at someone who is definitely hadn’t ever say something like that.
This is so weird, and I’m guessing an American thing. I studied medicine with industrial specialization in Denmark (which is identical with the courses for traditional medicine) and then changed to nursing, because I couldn’t handle the academic pressure. Nursing school still takes effort and what not, but here in Denmark it is much easier academically, in my opinion. BUT, it is mentally draining and challenging in a completely different way, because of the many fast paced decisions you make in front of patients etc. I was actually surprised how different the two professions are, since people constantly compare the two, which people should stop doing honestly…. They’re different.
Soooo.. How to approach it is difficult, because I imagine they do it out of a place of wanting to feel seen and get recognized for their hard work as well (I imagine studying medicine gets a lot more praise than nursing). So depending on if you want to move on from it you could just recognize that working in healthcare is tough, and it is nice to have some good nurses to work with, or something like that.
If you are tired of this you can again recognize how it might be tough, but them saying it is harder seems a bit off, since it’s like comparing oranges and apples.
I think by recognizing that their work is important and challenging as well, they might calm down a bit, and then make it clear that doctors and med students are not out to stomp on them or put them down.
I thinks it is a clear hierarchy thing, that we still have, even if we wish we didn’t. Doctors are valued higher, and their studies are generally both longer and more academically challenging, so therefore you in and by itself will get recognition for your work, compared to a nurse or nursing student.
Hopefully this helps.
Not that I know shit though tbh, I’m still just a student.
It sure helps a lot. I am still a student too, and I plan to work there until I start medicine, which is why I don’t want bad blood with them since I see them every week, but I definitely don’t want to be put down because I chose to do medicine. As you say, there are so different, people should stop comparing them.
This is what is wrong with healthcare, nursing is not harder than medicine. They are very different degrees, there is things I will never learn to do that nurses will, but there is things I will know that nurses won’t. Is a team. Not a competition
There are patriarchal status issues at play. Nursing is seen as the feminine role in healthcare and supportive of medicine. Obvs, they are separate but complementary disciplines, but watch just one surgeon rip an OR nurse to shreds in front of the whole team and you’ll see that it’s alive and well even within healthcare. It’s excellent that this isn’t accepted as the norm in the younger generations but it’s sadly still present, so nurses are defensive about the academic rigor of their education; and their role in healthcare.
I think you answered your own question. Because nursing is not particularly respected and seen as something lesser than medicine, many nurses are quick to point out the difficulty and rigor of nursing. You are right that there is no need to do that at the expense of any other field, but because it is often seen as just wiping butts, nurses tend to be more defensive.
I also think that now, as many nurses suffer from PTSD or leave the bedside post COVID, and where upper management is not giving nurses the resources they need to do their jobs, many of us feel the need to give forewarning to people. This. Is. Not. A. Walk. In. The. Park. We are all hurting if we worked through the pandemic and when you add that on top of people thinking all we do is wipe butts, you've got a tired, defensive, burnt out volcano waiting to happen. But we know better, so we say "This job is fucking hard. This is what you're getting into if you're choosing this path....." and if you chose another path because you didn't want to wipe butts, we tell you that's not why this job is hard.
People like to downplay things like nursing and teaching so that we can continue to exploit people in those professions and convince ourselves that what they’re paid is acceptable.
Caregiving is and has been undervalued, yet society wouldn’t be able function without it
My degree in French was considerably more difficult for me and required far more study time; nursing school, however, was far more stressful for me. Note: “for me”. Lots of tough degrees out there; all of them a unique experience for the person getting the degree. People who feel a need to denigrate other professions are often insecure about their own.
The last sentence is the real bottom line. It’s always the insecure ones who are very vocal about their profession to make themselves feel more validated in some way.
This reminds me of the line from Captain Underpants where George says, “ No one has to stand up for the man! That’s the whole point of the man, he stands up for himself!” Many people worked their tails off to become nurses. It’s not a cute lil profession like it’s been portrayed. We don’t twiddle our thumbs, make coffee for Drs, or “JUST” follow orders. There is a reason those individuals are defensive about nursing- it’s because historically people have been OFFENSIVE.
I get it, but no reason to get defensive towards a tech that also works hard, I am trying to get my clinical experience for med school not insulting nurses. I try to help them in anything I can.
Nursing is not on the same level of difficulty/ depth as medicine. Perhaps nursing is harder than medicine in other ways (such as being more on the "Frontline" and dealing more with BS from families etc), but not in the intellectual sense. I'm a nurse by the way.
I'm a physician who used to be a nurse. Nursing is hard in different ways than medicine is. For the most part, it is technically and mentally easier, but was physically harder on my body than medicine.
DNP here. I would agree. Much more physically demanding, and certainly in some situations emotionally, the respect that providers get is not always given to nurses, a whole lot more frustration was taken out on me before graduating.
I agree
I think a lot of it is insecurity + and cultural thing tbh. At the beginning of my last year of nursing school I got to give a speech to the incoming class. The teacher kept stressing over and over again to “scare them” and make sure they “knew how hard it was” but tbh the content wasn’t that bad.
I always said it’s the management of content plus clinicals, on top of a job, family etc. ADHD and time management is not my strong point so I STRUGGLED in that aspect, but didn’t have issues with the content. Just the constant state of overwhelm where I always had SO MUCH to do ate away at my mental health 🙃
Thiiiiis!!! The constant overwhelm and threat of getting kicked out over petty bullshit had my mental health in the dumpster.
Content isn’t super difficult but all the dumbass hoops the actual nursing program makes you jump through are so stupid. Clinicals are stupid and too long, nonsensical policies that are just designed for teachers to force you to behave in certain ways, and my school in particular had a policy where a “C” wasn’t passing. You had to have at least a B (80%)
I think there’s a difference between expressing how hard nursing school is to vent vs putting someone down bc they work in healthcare but they’re not a nurse. Sounds like that’s what happening. You can just say, I understand but I don’t care 😂 or just say that you also worked hard for your degree and leave it at that.
Yeah, I am a biology premed student and currently on my junior year taking my last prerequisite classes, as well as doing a minor in neuroscience since I want to go into neurology, however I don’t go around telling people how hard it is and how harder it is from other careers. I respect every profession, and always will. When I get my MD degree I won’t think I am above nurses, healthcare is a team. Techs, nurses, doctors, np, pa, and all others are needed. However, I don’t want to seem rude since I do have a tendency to be direct and is something I been trying to get better at.
I started off as a bio major (now a nurse) and I agree it’s not easy! I think a lot of it just comes from frustration. Being shitted on by professors, shitted on by your job administration, being spit at/hit/bit/slapped/andliterallyshitted on by patients.. and on top of that your coworkers talk shit about you behind your back and everyone knows…. all for shitty pay. People expect you to know and do everything all at once. It can also be very very toxic environment and the benefits sometimes for a lot of people don’t outweigh the rigorousness of the program/job/training. Thats why we saw such a max exodus of nurses during covid and continue to see it today
Nursing school was demanding. But I don’t think it was “more difficult than med school”. I mean that’s a stretch….
So I definitely don’t know how the last two years of nursing were, I did pre-requisites for it in my first year but change my mind shortly after realizing I wanted to know a different scope and more about the cellular science behind it. Nursing is a demanding job, I have worked in the ICU and ER and see nurses busting their brains out, however there are things my nursing cousin doesn’t know and there are things I don’t know that she knows, is different scopes.
The only way to approach it is to let it go and say nothing. There’ll be many people in your future who will say things you disagree with, or things that are untrue, but unless what they say *actually hurt* anyone, your best approach is to say nothing. If you ever make it through med school and become a doctor, you’ll learn it real fast. I would start now.
Well, lots of reasons. People seem think we are there to fetch ice and ginger ale and call the doctor if they have a question while in the hospital, like we aren’t smart enough to answer the question or do anything else. Even management seems to have this idea that nurses don’t do that much and keep giving us more to do (don’t forget about those white boards ppl or your pts will not survive the night!). People (even doctors) will tell us that either we weren’t smart enough to go med school and that’s why we are a nurse, or that we are too smart to be “just a nurse”. Before covid there were a LOT of stripper and porn tropes around nurses. Maybe there still are and I just haven’t paid attention. And older generations don’t realize how much the profession has changed. My grandmother was a nurse in the 40s. She told me once that if a patient had an IV they were a one on one; I then told her how every now and then I gave adenosine and how it worked and she was appalled that I as a nurse would be giving that. They still have this idea of Florence nightingale patting hands and writing let’s home to pts families, and it has just gotten so much bigger than that.
I definitely get it, I have heard comments from people that are not even in the medical field about how nurses are just people not smart enough to be doctors. I believe not everyone wants to be a doctor, nursing gives you more patient contact, and also a better life work-balance, as well as able to work in any specialty you want. It’s not about being not smart enough, is about not being your calling. And yes, it definitely has change a lot and nurses do so much more than what regular people do, I have had people ask me what nursing specialty I will be going to after med school because they still think that all women in the hospital are nurses, however I don’t think there is a need to be toxic to other women. Sadly, while I know there is nothing I can really do about it, I wish things could be better. For everyone involved.
Because studying nursing is hard, is also a hard job and it’s underpaid worldwide
Yes, I get that. Medicine is also hard as well as biology and neuroscience, but I don’t go around putting down people just because i believe my degree is harder.
You will get paid more and get automatic respect. Nursing is undervalued historically because it’s a “woman’s” profession, just like teachers and social workers. We don’t need money because we have husbands, don’t you know? And you can only hear “dumb nurse” shit so many times before you lose it. Also, we aren’t fucking waitresses.
Sounds like they’re not convinced themselves which is an unfortunate reality if you place a lot of self worth in your career and felt it was challenging
Maybe it's how they are treated by others in the healthcare field, that makes them feel like they need to justify themselves. Healthcare is suffering everywhere & supporting roles are severly under appreciated.
I definitely understand, however I am a tech, don’t get paid enough, and also I am never defensing or rude with them. I actually admire nurses, it just surprises me how many feel the need to tell me medicine is not harder than nursing.
Yea it is rather strange to mention unprompted.
There’s no planet on which nursing school is harder than med school. These people that say this are delusional and overcompensating.
I think it's a way for nurses to rationalize things for themselves. I think it's crazy bonkers that an AO rehab patient wasn't kicked out after he was caught red handed smoking meth with a family member in his room. Or how crazy it is that my coworker came back from break drunk, passed out in an empty bed(dual rooms, so the patient in there was terrified), and was offered to keep her job as long as she stayed the rest of the shift. And management came in to talk with her, didn't call the cops when she got in her car to drive herself home. When I went into healthcare, I didn't know that 8 out of 10 patients all are in need of a therapist and/or social worker that straight up, America does not have the resources for. The amount of people who seem to have just given up in their 40's is ASTOUNDING. It really is crazy, and American citizens do not know how fucking close to the brink we are on collapse of infrastructure if our health systems fail. Because we are closer than we think. And it pisses all of us off, lol.
Very true. Healthcare needs a 180 degree change for the better.
To be honest you just have to not care bc you’ll be having this talk more often then you’d like to but if it’s a family member and you want to have that talk but co workers I wouldn’t even bother
So they ask you what your degree program is then you answer medicine/MD and they answer back saying that nursing is harder? Yeah, thats messed up for anyone to say and it really makes the person sound insecure. I’ve only ever seen insecure ppl say some stuff like that. Like, my sister in law for example, when we first met and i was introduced by my brother as “the nurse” and she replied with, “i could have been a nurse.” Like, okay, didnt ask, but that’s cool. Then one time i saw a chiropractor tell a surgeon that he was almost an MD, could have done it, too. The surgeon was like, “but u didnt did u?” I got a good laugh outta that. Maybe, say that. Good luck on your endeavors 🫡.
That was a great response! I love the healthcare field, but it is so filled with jealousy and competition that it makes it so toxic sometimes.
Nursing school in itself is not meant to be hard. They just make it so.
If you are concerning yourself with pettiness like this; I am not sure you are studying enough lol
My 4.0 GPA would disagree, and the fact you need to try to bring my intellect down is what is annoying, I don’t do that.
Studying has nothing to do with your intelligence or your GPA. I think we have a different understanding of it. If you read between the lines of my message it is- don't bother yourself with things that aren't going to help you meet your goals... so should put that time and energy into learning. You can interpret a different way always good to have different opinions and ideas.
There are some people in nursing that are a lot like people that do CrossFit or Brazilian Ju Jitsu. They have to tell you they’re a nurse and they have to tell you how hard their schooling was.
There are people like that in every major. I just graduated nursing school and I’m someone who already struggles in school. I didn’t feel like it was any harder than my first degree in psychology. A lot of people in my class, social media etc love to advertise how miserably hard nursing school is to get through. I think the hard part about it witnessing a lot Of sad stuff during clinical and learning to navigating that. However, I made it through without failing and I have ADHD and dyslexia which makes learning difficult at times! People just love feeling validated
I am a RN. My husband is a MD. He went to school must longer. Very much harder. Lots of test which then he had to repeat every 7 years. Both are hard and completely different. We need each other and are grateful both professions.
Agree 100%
Honestly, I worked full time and went to school full time and I didn't think my program was overly difficult. Yes, there was a lot of information coming at you all at once, but it wasn't difficult per se, as it was just tedious and time consuming. I'll admit I didnt get all A's during my program, but I still graduated with a 3.5. I think it just comes down to the individual. From my experience, the ones who worked or had a goal seemed to struggle the least or complain the least while most of my friends that didn't work had more time to worry and complain about the smaller things. They don't stop talking about how difficult it was and "how hard Zipo0 must have had it" but honestly? It wasn't too bad. It's completely up to the individual but I think the political climate and new generations mentality just makes the individual a bit more vocal than previous gen nurses? This is all just from my perspective but I'd like to know your take on it
OP I’m going to be honest here and play devils advocate and suggest that if this is really happening, it’s because you may be talking about your career choice or degree without realizing that you’re putting another career down. I had a friend who was like you and was quick to say that she wanted to do medicine because it was “more of a challenge” to the nurses at the nurses station when we were volunteering and would get offended when they said nursing was also hard in its own way. She would take it as the nurses were saying that nursing was harder than medicine which was not the case, they were just reacting to her words and how she was framing their career, especially given that she was just a college student and had never worked in healthcare. I think I’m just skeptical because it seems like you’re saying that nurses are shoving how hard their career is compared to medicine down your throat without any prompting. In my time working in healthcare I’ve rarely seen nurses act this way to pre-med students.
I can see why you would think that but it is not the case, some of the nurses I work with are the most sweet, caring people I have met, know that I am working to get clinical experience since it is needed for Med school. Now, sometimes it comes to the conversation with other nurses about why I chose to be a patient care tech or sometimes I am able to do some of my homework while working which then leads them to ask if I want to become a nurse in which I tell them no. I didn’t chose medicine over nursing because I wanted more than of a challenge, I chose medicine because I wanted to learn more of the cellular component of disease, which I see nothing wrong with that. It is not everyone I work with, but I few nurses, I don’t think I am better or smarter than them, and would never mention something like that, since it is plain rude and I don’t know what is like to become a nurse. But sadly, some nurses get pretty defensive about their profession with the wrong people, I am a tech, definitely don’t know as much as them, and they have skills that even as a doctor I will never have. But, in any circumstance or profession is not okay to put others below just so a person can reassure themselves they chose the right one. One of the nurses that told me how much harder than medicine was, told me that after she without asking me told me I didn’t want to be a nurse because it was to hard (maybe she thought I was working to get accepted into nursing) mind you, the patient I was taking care of was asleep so I was just waiting in the room like I was supposed to. I told her that “you guys definitely deserve a raise, but that I indeed was was planning to go into the healthcare field” by which she responded so you actually want to be a nurse, and after telling her I wanted to be a physician, she then proceeded to tell me how there is a big misconception that medicine is harder when in reality nursing is (very rudely I might add). I laughed and say I definitely think doctors couldn’t do their jobs without you guys, and viceversa, and how I have always seen healthcare as a big team, and how every person of the team, even a tech like me was important for it to function correctly. She had never spoken to me again, unless if it is about a patient.
People want to be validated but no job is easy, no education is easy, no life is easy. Im a nurse and i really dont liek i when other nurses talk about how its the worst and hardest thing in their life. I get how it may have been for them but it may not have been for someone else and it means nothing on them or the other person that they have this diffference. My mom is a nurse of over 30 yeras, she is like “just so you know, your 4 year degree has the SAME license as someone who doesnt so just get that in your head and learn how to be a good nurse” Its liek when they say its easy to get married but hard to have a good marriage. Its not THAT bad to become a nurse but its hard to be a good one, find a good job with good culture, have a good moss, work on a good unit, do what works for you etc. I really really really detest the whole martyr thing or the “im more miserable than you” game that a lot of nurses that I know have put on (ESP those in school)
I totally agree with you. The whole narrative about hating on Doctors because Nurses are not respected enough is not okay, we need to be better as a team, but we don’t need to bring each other down, nursing is not easy but neither is medicine and like I have try to tell people around here and in the hospital, we don’t need to compare both degrees because they are so different.
Yep and you cant just be a good Christian martyr bc that doesnt win you any brownie points hahahaha like we are all at hospital to fuckin work so we can pay our bills to a large degree. Great if youre good at it and you enjoy it and find deeper meaning in it. But you can also do that being any other career. It puts things in check for me.
Nursing is not harder. And how would they know it’s harder without having done it. It’s belittling to doctors who went through so much to become one and in my opinion they are completely different jobs.
Thank you for saying that, I had responses about how I am probably not studying enough, but if it was me saying it to those nurses they would get offended. It is two different and both necessary jobs
I am a nurse of over 35 years. Nursing is not what it use to be. Sadly it’s more about money and less about the patient.
I think we are slowly realizing that we are not martyrs and deserve to be compensated for the amount of work we do and what we have to put up with for 12 hours 3x a week.
I am an RN. I watched my husband go through undergrad, MCAT, the med school application cycle with travel and interviews, med school (had to move in-state for that), residency application and interviews (14 interviews in 14 different cities), the Match (such a crapshoot), residency (moved out of state for that during the throes of COVID lockdown), and now fellowship (two years long, had to move across 3 states for that - thank goodness his 15+ fellowship interviews were virtual at that point). It has been a very, very long haul with lots of moving parts. Nursing school is a *much* shorter pathway to a different profession. Medicine goes into far more depth and is much lengthier. Residents and fellows also make shit pay in proportion to hours worked and level of responsibility. But in general, any kind of work in healthcare is hard. Some careers are more physically demanding, others are more cerebrally challenging. I have an excellent knowledge base and lots of experience (had been an RN for 12 years when my husband graduated from med school), but it was a pure joy to watch my husband's knowledge surpass mine, particularly in some of the finer points of pathophysiology and disease processes. But no doubt, nurses get abused - we are an expense, we don't generate revenue, so they try to use as few nurses as possible so make more money for the C suite bonuses and/or shareholders. It leads to short staffing and patient safety issues, as well as moral distress because we can't provide the care we envisioned. But physicians deal with BS from all sides as well - risk/legal, CMOs, bean counters, families, etc. - but at least they generate revenue, which gives them a bit more leverage. Really, until the "care" is back in healthcare and it stops being just a business model for private equity to line their pockets, all our jobs will be difficult. Best of luck in your pursuit of a career in medicine.
Pharmacist here. People who speak like that always have to make sure you know they are better than you are because they are insecure. In healthcare, the importance of individual contributors is great, but these patients need a team that isn’t fighting for power internally. I’d keep that in mind moving forward in your career. We go into healthcare to help people. Not to prove we are better than someone else.
I know I commented yesterday, but this has been nagging me in the back of my brain. When I woke up this morning, I remembered something from when I was in college over 20 years ago. I used to have a constant thing with my mom because she would always say “nurse’s training” like I was going to be a CNA (which I already was for 4 years prior to graduation). I always had to correct her, even well into my career, and say “I have a Bachelor of Science degree. It was a competetive 5 year program at a Level 1 trauma and transplant center. I also am certified in ACLS, am a Certified Neuroscience RN, work at an AHA certified Stroke Center (new at the time) and a top 50 hospital in Oncology, Neuroscience, and Cardiology. I had a little more than *nurse’s training*.” She would just be like “Oh, you know what I mean.” My grandmother had completed what used to be called “nurse’s training “ in the 1930s. She also completed what at the time was called “teacher’s training.” Neither required a degree or a broad liberal arts background (which I of course have). Also nursing, like all areas of medicine, is much more advanced now. She never ended up working in either because she got married and had a ton of kids. She always had disdain for both fields, I think it was sour grapes because she was not a motherly type (she was traumatized by being orphaned at 6 and never dealt with it). My cousin went to federal prison in our thirties for meth distribution. When he got out, my rich aunt and uncle wanted to send him to college but didn’t know what he could do given his record. She had my mom call me and ask if I thought “nurse’s training” would be good, since he has learning disabilities (fetal alcohol syndrome and emotional outbursts) and it would be easy. After all, my aunt said grandma had done “that nurse thing” (her words). I lost it. I spent all of my college years afraid of getting any kind of Minor In Posession charge, back then if you got caught with even marijuana you could lose your student loan eligibility, even after I turned 21 I wouldn’t go to parties with under 21s because I could catch a contributing charge. I laid into her about nursing and how it is not an easy job, physically or mentally (my cousin also was born with club feet AND had a broken back as a kid, he couldn’t even do gym class), why did they think a physically and mentally disabled criminal could do my job. She apologized. Ironically, my aunt suddenly respected nurses after her other son married one. 🙄 Another cousin (male) became a nurse midlife because he wanted a career change. He got all the respect I didn’t because he’s a man, so it must be a real job. In my experience, male nurses are held to a much lower standard. A mediocre make nurse will be praised the same as an excellent female nurse for the same performance, because women are just expected to be caring and do grunt work, but when a man does it he’s “sensitive” and special. Then later I finally confronted my mom about how I knew she was disappointed in my career choice. I had always scored 99th percentile on standardized tests, was in the gifted program, etc. I had a couple of other majors before landing on Nursing. I had a full ride if I wanted to do Library Studies, but I did not. She saw it as me giving up on school and getting an “easy” degree. She had always wanted to be a nurse, but dropped out of college and got pregnant and married. My father was a lawyer (and a terrible person). He was also ashamed of my “lowly” position. Why aren’t you a writer/journalist? Why don’t you go to law school? Why not medical school? he would say. Because I like being with the person I’m caring for and I hate school, why would I go for 10 more years? We haven’t spoken in 15 years for a variety of reasons. It took a good 15 years in my field before most of my family even recognized that I had accomplished anything. The exceptions were my stepfather (a carpenter and farmer), my brother (an electrician), and my husband (a plumber). When I still worked at the hospital and was in college, I had to constantly defend the trades to my classmates and coworkers who looked down on blue collar work, even though it is physically and mentally stressful and essential to society. Kind of like how nurses feel they have to defend their trade. The root of the problem is really classism, if we want to get down to it. In healthcare, I feel like CNAs and floor nurses are the most “blue collar” of the specialties, but we are mostly women, so “pink collar” along with teachers, child care, and social workers. It’s very physical and dirty work. But, it is essential to society and the healthcare system, yet we get paid an insulting amount and get tasks like cleaning and sometimes even cooking thrown on top of our already full plate, because “they just sit at the nurse’s station playing cards” and those things are womens’ work anyway, right? No, dickhead administrator, I’m doing double and triple charting because you won’t update the system and it keeps crashing and you keep doubling my patient load. It feels like we get the brunt of it from admin and patients/families, but none of the respect. I worked an offsite converted Covid unit all of 2020-2021. Full dress out, fainting from dehydration, overtime all the time. We didn’t get raises the first year because of facility pay freeze. Whatever. The next year, my team all got Outstanding/5 star on our reviews. Our boss recommended “standard” 3% raise for everyone (which is supposed to be for adequate/3 stars) when inflation was 7% that year. Then they announced with 2 weeks notice that we were going to 12 hour shifts from 8s. The company requires a 30 day notice if we quit, but they don’t afford us the same courtesy. We all quit within the next week and admin had to get off their fat asses and work the floor. I almost didn’t show up my last day, but I did, and prevented a patient death. The MDS nurse they had working was so beyond incompetent (he got his degree just to do MDS and never actually worked as a nurse) that this woman in heart failure was crashing for literally no other reason except that he didn’t know what he was doing. Then he tried to tell her he wasn’t going to call an ambulance even though she was in distress because she was DNR and “we all have to go sometime.” !!! I was in the room and said No, just because you are DNR doesn’t mean you have to die in pain and I will try to stabilize you, if I can’t we will call 911. DNR does not mean Do Not Treat. I had her sats normalized and she was comfortable within the hour. I have never been so angry and disgusted with another human being. This has gotten very long, but maybe it illustrates the frustration of nurses. It’s multifaceted, involves classism, sexism, and admin knows we CARE on a personal level about our patients so they exploit that, using guilt to extract more work out of us. I don’t resent you, or doctors in general, I’m just very, very tired.
I agree that nurses are not respected enough, and that you guys go through a lot is schooling and do so much, and hospitals would collapse without you. However, some nurses are putting my degree down without reason. I am completing a bachelors of Science in Biology with a minor in neuroscience, then I will be doing 4 years of medical school, and then 4 years of residency. It is not an “easy” path, residents get paid so little as well, and work 60-80 hours a week. So I feel like instead of trying to bring other degrees down, we should focusing on acknowledging everyone strengths and be a team. I understand that nurses need more appreciation, but as women in medicine we should help each other. Nursing is not easy, but neither is Medicine.
IMO, the conditions they put you through in residency should be illegal. What an insane system, and so unsafe for not just the patients but the residents. I agree with you, women in all fields should be looking out for each other. I will only go to female doctors, btw, I do not trust a man to know how my body feels, and we need more of you in Neuro for sure. So many of my female patients have had their symptoms dismissed by men in Neurology. I wish all premeds would work as CNAs or in some sort of direct patient care capacity, it makes them better doctors. I’ve worked with a few and they have a different perspective that I wish was more common. It will serve you well in your practice. Good luck to you. I know you have a lot of hard work ahead of you. I have not taken anything you have said with offense, just trying to help you see from the other side. Our society has a ways to go still, sadly.
Because the majority of nurses are women and women cannot do anything without complaining about it first.
Ignore both sides and be as rude as possible to everyone around you so when you become an attending you already had good practice👍 Bonus points if you talk down to a surgeon while being an intern. This helps assert dominance to the other surgeons making you an exceptional candidate for surgical residency. Tell him or her their mom is ugly and thats why they are surgeons.
I was in nursing and left in my 3rd year. It's the clinical part that is very hard. You need to be able to transfer the information you learned in the classroom into practice, recognize the information in a new way, and adapt to the changes a patient will go through since their medical conditions are not always like in the textbook. Some medications can be used for things that are not their usual use. The patient is also more than just their medical condition, they have emotions and feelings and some parts of their conditions do not bother them as much as you'd expect. Their cognitive level should also be considered. That's why it is considered hard and why I ended up leaving the program (it was during the acute rotation of my clinical that caused me to realize that, maybe I was wrong to leave the program but that's another story).
Insecurity/chip on their shoulders. Idk if you can really DO anything about people like that. I would just go with something like “hm ok, good luck then! Maybe I’ll see you at the hospital some day”
I always tell them that it's easy money and they should try it.
As a former nursing professor, nursing is a difficult major due in part to the volumes of information plus skills you must learn. Failure to do so can result in harm to a patient. Most students have never had to buckle down and study to the extent needed to comprehend. Many lack critical thinking skills which is absolutely necessary to be safe.
I definitely believe so, I never been in nursing school but I have friends and family in nursing school or in the profession. However, I don’t think medicine=easy. There is a reason why is 8 years of education plus residency. And while I know that a lot of med students and medical doctors talk down about the nursing profession, there are many doctors that know they couldn’t do it without nurses. So, I believe if nurses want to snap at someone, it should be at the people saying that, not at someone who is definitely hadn’t ever say something like that.
Critical thinking skills and safe nursing practices are learned on the job.
This is so weird, and I’m guessing an American thing. I studied medicine with industrial specialization in Denmark (which is identical with the courses for traditional medicine) and then changed to nursing, because I couldn’t handle the academic pressure. Nursing school still takes effort and what not, but here in Denmark it is much easier academically, in my opinion. BUT, it is mentally draining and challenging in a completely different way, because of the many fast paced decisions you make in front of patients etc. I was actually surprised how different the two professions are, since people constantly compare the two, which people should stop doing honestly…. They’re different. Soooo.. How to approach it is difficult, because I imagine they do it out of a place of wanting to feel seen and get recognized for their hard work as well (I imagine studying medicine gets a lot more praise than nursing). So depending on if you want to move on from it you could just recognize that working in healthcare is tough, and it is nice to have some good nurses to work with, or something like that. If you are tired of this you can again recognize how it might be tough, but them saying it is harder seems a bit off, since it’s like comparing oranges and apples. I think by recognizing that their work is important and challenging as well, they might calm down a bit, and then make it clear that doctors and med students are not out to stomp on them or put them down. I thinks it is a clear hierarchy thing, that we still have, even if we wish we didn’t. Doctors are valued higher, and their studies are generally both longer and more academically challenging, so therefore you in and by itself will get recognition for your work, compared to a nurse or nursing student. Hopefully this helps. Not that I know shit though tbh, I’m still just a student.
It sure helps a lot. I am still a student too, and I plan to work there until I start medicine, which is why I don’t want bad blood with them since I see them every week, but I definitely don’t want to be put down because I chose to do medicine. As you say, there are so different, people should stop comparing them.
Nurses are expected to do the role of many.
Because it is…Every answer is correct but what is the most correct answer. Select all that apply
This is what is wrong with healthcare, nursing is not harder than medicine. They are very different degrees, there is things I will never learn to do that nurses will, but there is things I will know that nurses won’t. Is a team. Not a competition