Be Proactive With Teaching Moments
At a family holiday party your 8-year-old nephew asks you "just what does a nurse do?" Do you say "takes care of patients," or use this moment to give him a real idea, described in a way he can understand, of the important work a nurse does daily?
What about when you conduct a mid-afternoon assessment on that cardiac patient? Plenty of observations come to mind as you do the examination, but do you share them with the patient?
According to Sandy and Harry Jacobs Summers, authors of Saving Lives: Why the Media's Portrayal of Nurses Puts Us All at Risk, that might be a good idea. "These are teachable moments that can help patients and their families understand the critical thinking and science nurses bring to patient care," the Summers' say.
There are so many things, some of them seemingly insignificant, that nurses can do to broadcast their important work.
For example:
- when you walk into a patient's room, introduce yourself by name and tell him you are a registered nurse.
- start a program at your hospital to have medical students shadow a nurse several times (they do this at Dartmouth University medical school.).
- if you see an image of a nurse that is inaccurate, make your opinion known. According to the Summers' one nurse can make a difference. "When OR nurse Francine Brock of Placentia, CA, visited Las Vegas in 2006, she saw IGT's Nurse Follies slot machine, which features naughty nurse and battle-axe imagery. She wrote to Wynn Las Vegas. The casino quickly began converting its eight to 10 Nurse Follies slot machine to another theme, at a cost of $2,000 per machine." (Not everyone gets these quick results, but it's worth a try, the Summers' advise.)
- of course, you can always do the typical talk at your child's school on what nursing is like. There's nothing like reaching the impressionable mind and planting the idea about a rewarding profession.
For so many more ideas on how you can promote nursing, read
Saving Lives: Why the Media's Portrayal of Nurses Puts Us All at Risk. Then join the discussion here. Watch the video of the authors discussing their reasons for writing the book and why stereotypes can be so damaging.