A recent comment from a not so recent post…

I’m curently in an MN program and taking a research class. My research question is “Are nursing students influenced by television nursing characters in their career choice?” Anyone care to comment?

Let me be the first to chime in:

NO.

The first “grown-up” TV show I remember watching was Emergency.

I was completely enthralled with Randolph Mantooth. When my best friend, Theresa, told me that she and her mom were moving to LA, we decided to draw pictures for him because naturally, she would be able to walk up to his house and drop them off. Did I mention that I was in the first grade?

Years later I was enjoying Kim’s Emergency post and I came to the part about Nurse Dixie McCall. Unfortunately my reaction was: “There was a nurse on the show?”

Next show I remember was St Elsewhere.

I remember Christina Pickles portraying Nurse Helen Rosenthal. At the time I was aspiring to be either a belly-dancer or a truck driver, so no influence there.

Then there was ER. Didn’t Nurse Carol Hathaway start off the show with a suicide attempt after being lovelorn over a doctor?

I can honestly say that TV nursing characters have not influenced my career choice; rather, it was the real life nurses I came in contact with.

BTW, anyone interested in further reading on this subject should check out The Beautiful Hospital by Sallie Tisdale. This is an entertaining, well written article. I enjoyed the comments, too. It’s funny how people get so heated about this subject. One commenter writes:

“are you worried that makes you any less of a nurse or that nurses play any less of a role because people believe what they see on House. tough then. go to medical school and shoulder the bills…try not to bring everyone down with your pettiness.”

Umm, punctuate much?

Anyhow, lest you think there is a shortage of positive media about nurses, this piece was published in the Wall Street Journal last week and it is ABSOLUTELY a MUST READ. John Blanton was working as an editor at the Wall Street Journal when he decide to pursue a career in nursing. His description of working night shift in a Burn Care Unit is so dead on, it took me right back to when I was orienting in the MICU. It also reminded me of why I chose nursing. I’ll also mention that both my boss AND my mother decided to forward it to me, so those are two pretty heavy-duty thumbs up right there.