Nurses Rank Among Top Unsatisfied with Their Job

No Surprise...take away the belief of having power to effect change and you will see a group slowly wilt and crumble. Most will die (leave Nursing) others will try to survive (becoming bitter or not caring).  Without support from our Nursing Organizations we have no voice in decisions that enable us to care for the sick and dying. It is a "business" but we have dropped the ball in protecting our shares of stock.

I find it so disheartening that I agree with all of these comments.  

 It has never been about the nurses. It is about pleasing the customer; everything revolves around them. Hospitals live and die by patient surveys. Patients are no longer complaining about major issues, they are now complaining about not having wi fi in their rooms, the sheets not being soft enough, and having to pay to park! Really!!! It is a fight to keep floor adequately staffed. Wished I would have stuck to being a pharmacist

It is all about money now. And protecting the HOSPITAL, not the patient. Understaffed is now the baseline. We know it, the patients and families know it.

If anyone in my family is hospitilized, I will insist on being there to protect them.

It's hard to read stories like this working for a nursing agency, as you always hope your staff are happy and ready to come to you with any issues or complaints. The truth at the moment seems to be that focus in healthcare is geared towards saving money and ensuring patients are aesthetically cared for. A great shame.

Katie - Apex Health + Social Care

www.apexhsc.co.uk

Nursing was so different when I started in 1985. I have seen the focus of quality of patient care be replaced with it being all about the quality of patient care. Patient satisfaction surveys are a joke. I left Nursing administration 12 years ago and moved into education, because I thought quality and professional values where still important traits for a nurse. Even in education today, it is all about the money and how fast we can push a student to pass the 85new question NCLEX. I know many of you where like me and had to take 4 -200 question board exams over two days. Now it is like getting your drivers license.

What a shame we have been held captive by the computer and physicians who must have every diagnostic test imaginable. Or better yet they have to farm the patient out to consults to all the physicians in their group to share a piece of the insurance pie.

We as nurses need to educate patients about this broken system and help to reduce healthcare fraud.

Steve, RN

I do understand the competition in healthcare settings.  Good publicity does sell. We all want our institutions to be the best for medical and nursing care.  There is nothing wrong with this concept. What administration needs to understand is that selling the concept of "superior care" needs to be supported by providing the amount of people to perform this care. What nurse doesn't want to do the best at their job?  We need extra services such as: having ancillary resources for support that are proficient and competent in their specialty, sufficient and easily read electronic charting programs that allow time to BE WITH YOUR patient while completing this LEGAL document, providing nurses with a lunch or dinner break uninteruppted so they have a chance to decompress at some point in their shift.

   Hotels have multiple personel trained for certain tasks. A medical institution utilizes the nurse to fulfill all of the tasks that hotel personel are trained for.  Why is this?  Because we are the forefront for the patient.  We are the people that the patient sees day in and day out.

    I believe that if hospitals want to be the "superior institution" adminstration needs to get hands on. They need to witness what  happens with nursing and patients on a daily basis and give us what we need to "remain the nurses we became and still want to continue to be".

You hit the nail right on the head...I remember the 'good ole days' when we could be proud of our profession.  I hope I live long enough to see it go back to that!  In the meantime, the horror stories continue~

I started feeling more like a hotel maid than a highly skilled healthcare provider. The administration's priority was on "patient preference" for crushed or cubed ice being noted on their white board over spending time analyzing pertinent lab values or collaborating with doctors.

Its all about customer satisfaction or so the insurance companies say. We are being trained to give the best experience no matter the issue at hand, the patients illness.