I've discovered that nurses are a) seriously overworked and b) absolutely the best!

They do things that other people would shun. Really think about that. They are also underappreciated, which is a real shame because there aren't many professions in the world more awesome than nursing. We need to shower nurses with appreciation for their work because the things that nurses do for their patients are among the most noble on the planet.

In case you have any doubt about how cool nurses are, check out my five reasons that nurses totally rock...

1. They Are Patient Advocates

If you or a loved one is in the hospital, make sure you are as kind as possible to the nurses. There is no one you can trust more in the hospital than the nursing staff. They are true patient advocate. Rushed doctors can sometimes not be as thoughtful about patient care as they could be, which is why it is so cool that nurses are always willing to fight with the doctors to get their patients the best care possible.

Always remember to do everything you can to support the nurses in their efforts as your patient advocate. If the nurses are urging you to talk with the doctor about a certain aspect of your care, do it. Nurses always have their patients' best interests at heart, and they deserve the highest of fives for the level of advocacy they demonstrate daily.

2. Nurses Are the Ultimate Lovers of Humanity

One of the most admirable attributes that nurses demonstrate is their ability to provide stellar care to every person who walks through their doors. Whoever a person is, whether they are good or bad, they will be treated equally by nurses.

Nurses ensure that every patient gets the level of care they deserve as a member of the human race. It takes an amazing kind of soul to treat every segment of society equally. The fact that it is just par for the course for nurses shows precisely why they are so awesome.

3. Their Bravery Is Remarkable

Because nurses treat every member of society equally, they are exposed to the best and the worst it has to offer. While interacting with the bottom rungs of society, they can be insulted, shouted at and even attacked. It takes an incredible type of person to bravely face a work environment where you will be exposed to some of the dregs of society. Nurses walk through the doors of the hospital every day knowing that they may face a mentally ill or criminally desperate person who could make their work dangerous.

4. They Cover Some Serious Distance

If a nurse ever challenges you to a walking contest, you better make sure you are in shape. The average American walks 2.5 to 3 miles per day. On the other hand, nurses average four or five miles just during their workdays on a 12-hour shift. The kind of endurance nurses need to respond to many patients simultaneously while being on their feet all day makes them true heroes.

With that in mind, you might want to think about how long the nurses have been on their feet during their shift when you interact with them. They work so hard and in such a grueling manner that they deserve to be treated with respect. When you think about getting upset in the hospital, keep in mind that nurses are doing everything they can to make your stay as pleasant as possible.

5. They Have the Best Stories

Because they are so caring and see people at their best and worst, you will find that most nurses are treasure troves of stories. Their stories range from the heroic to the tragic to the hilarious, and you can bet that every nurse has several of the most incredible stories you will ever hear in your life. If you want to make a friend who is caring and full of great stories, there is no better friend than someone who wears nursing scrubs.

It is indisputable. Nurses totally rock. They do the hard work of taking care of people when they need it the most. We should always do everything we can to show love and support to the hard-working members of the nursing world.

For many nurses, the time between November and February tends to present times that could offer fun and stress relief. However, for the exact same reasons, stress can mount from various sources.

We look forward to seeing family. Cooking those once a year dishes, to share with others, can invite lifelong memories. Of course, juggling work into the mix is part of the everyday life of a nurse. Then time starts to meander through the calendar of various holidays. A churning stress starts to invade our peaceful thoughts of how events were meant to unfold.

Circumstances can create challenges. A nurse’s schedule is most likely already established before the holiday season arrives. Then reality happens. Family members may alter plans that interrupt a fluent strategy for what happens when. Speaking of schedules, as a nursing supervisor I recall many schedules that were constantly being adjusted depending on staffing needs and various circumstances.

Then that moment arrives. Exhausted and stressed from feeble attempts to micromanage potential new memories, you hear a still small voice in your head say, “I just cannot wait for the holidays to be over.”

Perhaps there may be a side step of planning that helps to keep things in perspective.

A survival strategy could include the following:

1. A calendar.
2. Lists.
3. Willingness to adjust and let go.
4. Breathe.
5. Appreciate moments as they happen.

It all starts with a willingness to be realistic. Planning for all meals, all favorite desserts, all family gatherings... definitive word is “all”... is overwhelming. However, prioritizing may help.

1. Try making a comprehensive list of all you may like to do.
    
2. Then look at the list and mark each item how high a priority it is to accomplish.
    
3. For items that you cannot live without, be honest, and let this be known.
    
4. For other choices that are not as important, rank them lower. Maybe there will be time. But it will be much more rewarding if you are not stressed out.
    
5. Keep your calendar handy and up to date.

A vital tool for staying organized and focused on your priority items is the calendar. If you need to prepare something ahead of time, then schedule it like an appointment on the calendar so that time does not sneak away. If you run out of time, you may rush through an activity, thus experiencing less joy than you may have otherwise. Stress results when trying to fit too many tasks into limited time.

Anything that can be done ahead of time, do not wait until the last minute.  Mark your calendar with tasks that could be done by a certain date to stay on target to enjoy your plans. 

Remember this, when considering your wishes for the season, allow time just to treasure that thing we call “now.”

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Nurses bring a wealth of clinical understanding to the chief executive role, but they have to master business skills and a wider focus if they want to succeed.

When Leah A. Carpenter, RN, MPA, went into nursing 30 years ago, she did not intend to follow a career path to administration. In fact, early in her career, she was pretty skeptical about the folks in the C-suite.

"I had no desire to be a suit whatsoever," says Carpenter, who is now Administrator and Chief Executive Officer at Memorial Hospital West in Pembroke Pines, FL.

"There was a very big disconnect between the C-suite—and even middle management—and the rank-and-file staff. I really didn't have a great deal of respect for or want anything to do with a leadership at that time."

Then a bit of what she calls "divine intervention" nudged her into the administrative realm. "I lost my hearing progressively over the last past 20 years, so I'm virtually deaf in one ear," she says.

"I had to make a decision whether I wanted to go into management or education, because that's pretty much the two paths that a nurse can take if she's not going to be at the bedside."

Despite that unconventional beginning, Carpenter has risen to the top as a CEO. Now she has some insights and advice for RNs who are considering a CEO role.

Q. What talents, skills, and insights can a nurse bring to the CEO role?

A. Besides the obvious, which is the clinical background and really understanding what it takes to give safe, quality care that is service-oriented, I think I understand the struggle and what the staff needs to be able to deliver that.

That allows me to garner a certain level of respect from the team because they know I've been where they are.

Q. Do you think nurses who become CEOs face unique challenges?

A. Yes, in some respect. It's been easier for me personally in terms of mastering the role because I have the advantage of understanding the intricacies of the clinical world. I think it has been difficult—I've accomplished it but it's taken a while—to garner the respect as a businesswoman as well as a clinician.

Not every nurse leader or CNO can transition from the clinical world into the administrative world.

Q. Do you think there's a major difference between CNO thinking and CEO thinking?

A. Absolutely. You have to still have the understanding and the insight of the CNO, but there's a completely different skill set that you have to master in order to be a CEO.

You have to learn that balance. You can't look at it from just the eyes of a nurse. You're everyone's voice and you represent everyone—the clinical side, the dietary side, the environmental side, the construction side, the legal side.

There's a whole scope of skills and negotiation abilities that you need to have to balance all of that.

Q. What advice do you have for nurses interested in becoming CEOs?

A. It shouldn't be about the title or about the money. It needs to be about the impact: What do you hope to achieve and deliver? What's the end product?

For me, the end product was having an impact on safety, quality, and service, but at a table where I could really make a difference by having the experience as well as learning the business end of it.

I would steer [prospective nurse CEOs] away from a graduate degree in nursing. I think it limits your scope. They have to look at a business or administration type master's degree.

Also, mentors are key. You have to find people who are really good at this, attach yourself to their hip, and learn everything you can from them.

Not everybody's not going to be a great leader, but you can still learn from bad leaders. You can learn what not to do, and you can develop yourself into the kind of leader you want to be, knowing the things that don't work.

Interested in learning more about this or maybe have a general question? Ask one of our Nurse Leaders today.

An Orlando nurse who helped deliver a premature baby on a Southwest Airlines flight said she didn’t think twice about jumping in to help.

Baby “Jet” was born 14 weeks early on Sunday and remains in the Intensive Care Unit.

Loretta Bledose works on the business side at Orlando Health, but she was a nurse for 40 years.

That experience was crucial on her way home from a wedding in Philadelphia when a woman went into labor on her flight.

“She said, ‘My water broke. I’m pregnant. My water broke.’ I said, ‘How pregnant are you?’ She said, ’26 weeks.’ I said, ‘Oh, my God,’” said Bledose.

A flight attendant handed Bledose some gloves, and minutes later, the baby was born.

“There was a bulge there and I put my hands down and eased the baby out. She had a little two pound baby,” said Bledose.

A doctor on the plane also helped.

The baby wasn’t due until March 8 and had been cleared to fly by her doctor.

The mother is a nurse at Parrish Medical Center in Titusville, and Bledose said she remained calm throughout the ordeal.

“She kept apologizing, and I said, ‘Honey, this is out of your control,’” said Bledose.  

Bledose held the tiny baby in a blanket as the pilot diverted the plane to Charleston, South Carolina.

“I just kept praying, and every breath, I just kept saying, ‘Keep doing it baby, keep doing it,’” said Bledose.

When it was time for landing, Bledose was on her knees, holding the baby tight.

“I was just hanging on to mom and baby, and I said, ‘Just land, and we’ll be OK,’ and we were,” Bledose said.

The mother and baby were rushed to the hospital. Bledose continued on to Orlando, thankful she played in a role in what she calls a miracle.

“I believe that God puts you where you need to be. I truly believe that,” Bledose said. 

 

Here’s an alarming statistic: Around one in four nurses has been physically attacked at work in the last year. Patients often kick, scratch, and grab them; in rare cases even kill them. In fact, there are nearly as many violent injuries in the healthcare industry as there are in all other industries combined. Healthcare workers make up 9 percent of the workforce.

There are currently no federal rules mandating that hospitals attempt to protect nurses from violence in the workplace, though some states have passed them on their own. State-specific measures include requirements that hospitals develop violence-prevention programs, such as teaching de-escalation techniques, and increased penalties for people convicted of assaulting healthcare workers. In October, California passed the toughest guidelines in the country, obligating healthcare employers to develop tailored violence-prevention plans for each workplace with employees’ input. But the problem has gotten so bad that the U.S. Department of Labor is considering setting nationwide workplace-safety standards for hospitals in order to prevent this kind of abuse.

Patients with dementia or Alzheimer’s and patients on drugs were the most likely to hurt nurses, according to one research study published last year in the Journal of Emergency Nursing. The study surveyed more than 700 registered nurses at a private hospital system in Virginia, and 76 percent said they had experienced physical or verbal abuse from patients and visitors in the previous 12 months. About 30 percent said they had been physically assaulted.

Working directly with patients in emotional and physical pain has always put healthcare workers at risk of violence. But  in the past decade or so, there has been a 110 percent spike in the rate of violent incidents reported against healthcare workers. The intensifying abuse has a lot to do with money: During the Great Recession, public and private hospitals began slashing budgets at the same time people were losing jobs—and their health insurance. That meant fewer nurses and security guards available to help when patients got out of control, and more people turning to hospitals instead of private practice for medical care since they couldn’t be turned away due to lack of insurance. States also cut billions of dollars in funding for preventative mental-health services, which likely had a significant effect on the frequency of violence against doctors and nurses. Psychiatric patients are increasingly seeking treatment in hospital emergency rooms, where staff are often unprepared to deal with violent outbursts. “This is creating volatile, unpredictable situations,” says Bonnie Castillo, a registered nurse and director of health and safety for National Nurses United, a labor group representing more than 160,000 nurses across the country. Her organization has been pushing states to pass laws to protect workers in the healthcare industry.

"A delirious patient kicked her so hard in the pelvis that she slammed into a glass wall and fell to the ground. She was two months pregnant."