Men in nursing

Of the 2.1 million registered nurses in the United States, only 5.4% of them are male. Men also make up only 13% of all new nursing students.

Historical perspective

In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus mentions a male inn keeper being paid to nurse an injured man.

During plagues that swept through Europe, nurses that were male were primary caregivers, and in 300 B.C men in the Parabolani created a hospital and provided nursing care. (It has been asserted, without proof, that the brotherhood was first organized during the great plague in Alexandrian episcopate of Dionysius the Great (second half of third century). They received their name from the fact that they risked their lives (paraballesthai ten zoen) in exposing themselves to contagious diseases. In addition, they constituted a bodyguard for the bishop. Their number was never large. The Codex Theodosianus of 416 (xvi, 2, 42) restricted the enrollment in Alexandria to 500.

There were numerous other nurses that were male throughout the Middle Ages as religion controlled everything and women were not only excluded from anything to do with authority, but were being slaughtered as "witches" as well. St. Benedict started the Benedictine nursing order. The Alexian Brothers, in the 1300s, provided nursing care for the victims of the Black Death. These two organizations are still in existence today.

Military, religious, and lay orders of men continued to provide nursing care throughout the Middle Ages. Some of the most famous of these were the Knights Hospitalers, the Teutonic Knights, the Tertiaries, the Order of Saint Lazarus, the Order of the Holy Spirit, and the Hospital Brothers of St. Anthony.

St. John of God and St. Camillus de Lellis were both nurses who are now considered saints. St Camillus invented the symbol of the red cross and created the first ambulance service.

In 1783 James Derham, a slave from New Orleans, earned his freedom by working as a nurse. He went on to become the first black doctor in the United States.

Walt Whitman (1819-1892), a poet and a writer, volunteered as a hospital nurse in Washington, DC during the Civil War.

Nursing schools for men were common in the United States until the early 1900, more than half of those offering paid nursing services to the ill and injured were men. Yet by 1930, men constituted fewer than 1% of RNs in the United States.". As they found other, more lucrative occupations, they left nursing behind.

In the past, men usually became nurses involuntarily "on to spot" in the midst of war, often religious wars, in an effort to save their fellow soldiers' lives. War was not the realm of women. This was the case until Florence Nightingale was allowed on the battlefield to minister to soldiers. When she attempted to go to work as a nurse her upper-class family opposed her. In those days, hospitals were often dirty and dark and nurses were poor women who were often badly trained, sometimes malnourished and unhealthy as well. In 1854, the British press began reporting that soldiers wounded in the Crimean War were being poorly cared for in deplorable conditions. Nightingale recruited and equipped a group of nurses and went off to Turkey to help. Her arrival was not celebrated by the surgeons there, who resented the interference of a woman. Undaunted, she worked tirelessly to improve conditions in the hospital. Her changes revolutionized British military medical care, increasing standards for sanitation and nutrition and dramatically lowering mortality rates. While visiting the front lines, she became ill and never really recovered.

The American Assembly For Men in Nursing was founded in 1971. The purpose of AAMN is to provide a framework for nurses as a group to meet, discuss, and influence factors which affect men as nurses.

In Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan, 458 U.S. 718 (1982), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that Mississippi University for Women's single sex admissions policy for its nursing school violated the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote the landmark opinion.

In the 1980-1990’s, "inflation, a shortage of nurses with the accompanying rise in nurses’ wage, as well as a change in gender attitude, brought many men into the profession."

Increasing numbers

More men are joining women by entering the nursing profession, in which they discover that it is a competitive and challenging career. "Study after study demonstrates that men come to the nursing profession for the same reasons women do. They want to care for sick and injured people, they want a challenging profession, and they want reasonable job security with good wages".

As many Western nations are facing a shortage of nurses, many governments and nursing schools are actively recruiting more men as nurses. In example, when the University of Pittsburgh increased its admission requirements for its nursing program, the number of male applicants spiked significantly.

Spokesman Thomas Holly stated on behalf of all male nurses in University of Limerick that they are currently celebrated in all hospitals throughout the Mid-West of Ireland and female nurses continually look forward to seeing male nurses arrive on wards.

Men are commonly seen working in the US Armed Forces and in VA medical facilities.

Prejudice and discrimination

Today, while overt discrimination against male nurses is rare, many nurses that are male still feel that they are not treated as equals.

Some nurses believe they need to prove themselves more than their female counterparts, and that promotions are more likely to be given to female nurses; although the opposite is actually true:

"ALL NATIONAL Health Service Trusts must review their employment policies after a study found that male nurses climb the career ladder much more quickly, despite women having better qualifications and more experience. The largest study so far of nurses employed by the NHS found that men were twice as likely as women to be serving in the highest nursing grades - though they make up only 7 per cent of the workforce. The report, commissioned by the Department of Health, said direct discrimination against women could not be ruled out. Male nurses were more likely than women to expect to move to a better job sooner, and women were more likely to work in specialties with limited chances for promotion, such as community nursing. Yet female-registered nurses had better post-basic nursing qualifications than equivalent male nurses and were just as likely as men to be oriented toward a career in nursing, said the Policy Studies Institute, which carried out the survey of more than 14,000 nurses."

Female nurses were 10 times more likely to have taken a career break for babies. Less than half of female nurses worked part-time compared with one in 20 male nurses. For nurses working in "family friendly" environments, women were more likely to work nights than men, or part-time. All parents felt childcare facilities offered by employers were unsatisfactory.

Women tended to have better nursing qualifications than men, but a greater proportion of unqualified male nurses said they had been encouraged to take further training compared with equivalent female colleagues. The men were also more likely to have course fees paid. Louise Finlayson, co-author of the report, said: "Disadvantage for women is present at relatively junior positions and becomes greater as seniority increases." The health minister, Helene Hayman, said: "Inequalities amongst female and male staff have no place in a dependable Health Service. The Government is determined to tackle discrimination."

As the study was released Frank Dobson, the Secretary of State for Health, said nurses should get a pay increase to stop the escalating recruitment crisis. A basic-grade nurse starts on pounds 12,855, compared with a police constable on pounds 15,438.

Although male gynecologists and obstetricians are common, and male nurses do work on maternity and gynecological sections of hospitals, some male nurses have struggled to work in these departments.

See also

• Nurse stereotypes

External links

• http://aamn.org/
• http://www.rnmen.com/
• http://www.minoritynurse.com/men-nursing
• http://www.malenursemagazine.com