The Gender Equality Checkpoint

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by DanaC

It is changing I think, slowly but I think it is gathering pace. The idea of nursing as a credible and respectable career for young men to go into is becoming much more culturally accepted than it once was. I quite often see male nurses in tv shows now where they were kind of a novelty thing at one time.

When I was friends with student nurses - we all worked together in a pub - there was one male nurse across the whole year.

I've just been discharged from hospital, and although the female nurses FAR outnumbered the men, within a week on one ward I had three male nurses. All younger than me, all obviously at the beginning of their careers, but I was heartened all the same. And given that the ward was mixed gastro-intestinal, albeit each individual section was gender separated, I think some of the male patients would have been pleased about this. When I walked to the Day Room I saw patients aged 20-70 (guessing). The older gents may have expected female nurses, and even been more comfortable with them. But the younger ones may have appreciated a bit of banter with their blood pressure cuffs and anal swabs.

Personally I didn't care. The only nurse I didn't like was the very brusque female senior nurse (female) who came back from two days loff and said, "Oh, you're still here then."

[xoxoxoBruce]

When I was young my peer group, which included several nurses, a dentist, and an anesthesiologist, assumed any male nurse was queer. A lot of guys were drafted right out of high school during the Vietnam War, and most had no trade when they got out. Consequentially the ones who became medics, and there were a ton of them, came out with something they could pursue, nursing. Then it became more common to see male nurses in hospitals, although schools, clinics, and doctor's offices are primarily still female domain.