Would You Want Your Child To Be A Nurse?

My daughter chose to be a nurse in costume for Halloween.  Of course she looks amazing cute in the outfit but it did make me question “what if she really wanted to be a nurse?”

How do I feel about that?  Well, if my daughter wanted to be a nurse, there is no doubt that I would support her.  However, I do have several concerns.

The nursing profession is not what it can and what it should be.  Women and men go into nursing because they really care about patients and want to help them get better.  The tasks that nurses are required to do are things that you could not pay most people enough money to do.  Nurses come in contact with every bodily fluid and every disease imaginable…even Ebola.

The thought of my daughter Jillian going into nursing causes me great concern.  What patients will she have to care for who have strange new illnesses?  How will her health and safety be protected?  When she joins the profession, will nurses continue to be asked to take care of more patients with fewer resources?  Will nurses continue to have less and less time with their patients because they are too busy performing electronic documentation?  Will patient observation go more like an E-ICU where a patient is monitored electronically and on camera while the nurses go in only to administer medications and perform tasks?  Will she be able to attend to the psychosocial needs of her patients?  Will nurses continue to be paid less even though they are professionals with years of experience?  Will they still be treated as handmaidens to physicians?  Will they still be required to make sure their patients are satisfied with their care like waitresses making sure customers are enjoying their food?

These questions and many, many more cause me concern when I think of Jillian and her possible career choice.  It all reminds me now, more than ever, that it’s time for nurses to take back their profession and grasp their power again.  It’s time for nursing services to be included in the room charge along with dietary and housekeeping but rather to have their own charge for their services and being paid more for treating patients who require more care, just as a physician who spends more time with a patient charges more?

It’s time for nurses to no longer be the largest cost center in the hospital but rather the largest revenue producing center by having a separate charge for their services.  It is time for nurses to reclaim our profession because I believe that nurses have the answers to the problems of health care now but are not being heard.

As nurses, we can be part of the solution to transform our profession into one that provides the type of care for which we all entered nursing to give.  Physicians gave up control of their profession by selling out and becoming employees of the hospitals.  Now physician incomes are dramatically less than what they once were.

It is time for nurses to speak up and to become part of the solution and reclaim our profession.

I would love to read your thoughts on this topic by leaving a comment below on how we can reclaim our profession.