Real-Life Nursing Vs On-Screen Nursing

Copyright: Scrubsmag

Some people learn
everything they know about nursing as a profession from television shows and
movies. Those are the people whose attitudes about nursing are the most
annoying.

• 1.       Normally, you rarely see nurses in medical
  dramas. End up in the hospital for real and nurses are pretty much all you see.
  When you are sick, doctors might visit for five or 10 minutes – or more if
  you’re in the ICU. Most of your care is delivered by nurses and ancillary
  personnel. All the doctors do is show up, examine, issue orders and take off.

• 2.      Not to downplay their role, to be sure, but the
  difference between House and real life is huge. All you need to see, as a medical
  professional, is the episode in which residents do all the scans and all the
  pathology for a patient with a copper allergy. Given the demands on residents’
  time, it’s insane to think that any one of them would be stuck down in the path
  lab or MRI suite, pushing buttons or staring at slides. Even the best-funded
  hospital system in real life couldn’t manage that.

• 3.      Moreover, nurses on TV aren’t the ones prepping
  the patient for surgery or adjusting drips. Even the most basic jobs are done
  by doctors – the nurses simply don’t show up. Now, I understand the demands of
  drama, but that’s ridiculous. Time after time, we’re relegated to non-speaking
  roles, stuck in the background of dramatic scenes or running down the hallway
  pushing a stretcher. Since we’re invisible onscreen, we’re often invisible in
  real life. 

•  4.     Let’s look at dramas where nurses are portrayed
  – they are either sitting at a reception gossiping or eating some sort of
  snacks. Wake up people, nurses are never idle people! I work a 12-hour shift
  and I hardly find myself sitting down until I take my break which mostly will
  be about 9 hours into the shift. Sometimes I don’t even have the opportunity to
  because of the workload.

• 5.      Don’t watch clinic matters and assume all nurses are females. There are male nurses too and I
  am one!