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The nursing profession has consistently ranked No. 1 in Gallup's annual poll of Honesty and Ethical Standards in Professions for the past 15 years — which makes the rampant bullying and hazing that persists among nurses that much more surprising.
Judith Meissner, RN, MSN coined the phrase "nurses eat their young" in a 1986 article to describe the hostility young nurses face at the hands of their more experienced coworkers. In a follow-up article published 13 years later, Ms. Meissner said "students, new graduates and even experienced 'new hires'" still suffered intense bullying.
According to a 2017 blog post by Pittsburgh-based Select International Healthcare, roughly 85 percent of nurses have been abused by a fellow nurse and approximately one in three nurses have considered quitting the profession due to bullying.