Nearly everyone today has access to the internet and can Google anything they can think of. But if you have a non-emergent health-related question and you know a nurse, you’re probably going to ask that nurse before you make an appointment to be seen by a doctor. If the nurse doesn’t know, they probably know where to find the information and they will make sure that it’s credible.
When Sally Sue looks up the autoimmune disorder lupus and sees two articles, which one is she going to give more credit to? The article written by someone with years of formal education, a degree, certifications and years of experience in the health care field or Joe Johnson who also writes about why it’s healthy for your dog to take walks in the park, this year’s best tech gadgets and the new box office hit that’s playing in iMax theaters? Sally is going to choose the educated health care professional and there is good reason for that.
Experience
Nurses who have been out in the work force for any length of time have gained more experience than a great deal of the general population. All of the time spent working and taking care of others and responding to ever-changing situations has taught them lessons that you can’t learn in school. It’s been their job and even when they’re not at work their eyes and ears are always tuned into health-related topics and issues. It may be friends and family asking for advice, a TV show or movie, a magazine article, social media ad or post.
Nurses are always tuned in. Imagine being at a family reunion or out with some friends and someone either gets hurt, faints or has some other medical-related issue. Would you expect a nurse that’s part of your group to jump in and take charge? Of course you would. It doesn’t matter what their specialty is. Maybe they’re a psychiatric nurse and not an ER nurse. But they’re still a nurse, right? Surely, they learned something about it in school. More than the average bystander.
Compassion
Nurses became nurses for a reason. Some may think it’s because of the pay. It’s true that nurses generally get paid a decent wage for the service they provide. But look at what they had to go through to become a nurse. Years of schooling and rigorous testing. It’s not cheap to go to nursing school and then pay for the supplies, scrubs, stethoscopes, testing, etc. And the things they have to deal with in terms of administration, upset and sometimes abusive patients, family, long hours on their feet, back pain, and on and on.
It takes a special kind of person to go through all of that and take care of others and their families while these nurses spend so much time away from their own. Nurses take care of people who don’t appreciate them and what they’re doing. They take care of everyone. No matter what their background or social status. Political affiliation doesn’t matter. If you’re a person, you get taken care of.
Education
An LPN/LVN spends at least one year in school (sometimes more with general classes). An RN with an associate degree spends at least two years in classes and clinicals. A nurse with their bachelor’s degree has at least four years of schooling. And so on and so forth with master’s and doctorate degrees. In addition to formal education these nurses have continuing education to keep their license. There are so many certifications that can be earned that someone could have what looks like alphabet soup behind their name.
These nurses have been working alongside other nurses with more and less experience than themselves. This means that they have both learned from other, more experienced nurses, and have taught newer, less experienced nurses. This is education you rarely get in the setting of formal education.
Researching & Teaching
These health care professionals also take the time to look up diseases, medications, procedures, best practices and anything else that their patients have gone through, are going through and will go through to better understand how to educate and prepare themselves, their patients and the patient’s family. Self-study is an on-going process along with the required continuing education. On-the-job experience is a great teacher and it’s very different from what and how you learn in the classroom.
Critical Thinking
One thing that is specifically taught during nursing school is critical thinking skills. These student nurses are taught how to think critically using the knowledge they have gained from their studies, in-class lectures and clinical rotations. They must be able to put all the pieces together in order to create the nursing care plan and anticipate the patient’s needs and possible complications.
They must learn how to prioritize tasks and patients. Which one needs to be addressed first and which ones can wait. They also have to be able to manage their time and arrange tasks based on the time that they have available. There are so many things that must be taken into consideration at the same time and they have to be good at it. These prioritizations can either save or cost someone their life. Yes, this is an extreme example, but a very real one that happens often.
Connections
These nurses are connected to a pool of other health care workers. They know other nurses. And not just nurses who do what they do but also nurses who specialize in other areas. Those connections may be professional or personal. They not only know other nurses but also nurse practitioners, physicians, physician’s assistants, specialists, ultrasound technicians, radiology technicians, other professionals in managerial positions, and many more areas of the health care industry.
Tying It All Together
All of these things coming together in one single individual makes for one amazing resource. Just think of the personal touch from being on both sides of the stethoscope and being able to translate the medical jargon into terms everyone can understand. These nurses can think in terms of how they would explain something to their nonmedical friends and family. They can do it with compassion and respect.
Complex health issues can be simplified so that better informed decisions can be made. Their education has taught them so many of the fancy medical words and how to break them down to explain to others as well as to be able to learn new ones themselves. The on-the-job learning from others and then teaching patients, their families and other nonmedical people is the perfect way to see the information from multiple points of view. They’ve essentially learned how to translate from one language into another.
Throughout their formal education, continuing education, certifications and day-to-day professional upkeep these nurses have been taught how to research and select the most relevant and reputable sources. They have practiced and put these skills to work year after year to find the information they need for their own education and for the education of their peers, supervisors, administrators and their patients and patient’s families.
And with the connections they have made over their career, just think of all the collective knowledge that could be used as resources for articles, interviews, insight into where the medical field has been, is right now and where it’s going from all the various aspects of health care. Nurses are in a unique position to write health-related content for individual companies, nonprofits and health care systems alike.
Ethan Pariseau is a registered nurse with a bachelor of science in nursing and is licensed by the state medical board of Ohio to practice massage therapy.