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Doll in Nursing Uniform
My first nursing uniform as an aide was a green dress. Starched. With a belt. The next, as a nursing student, was a blue and white striped dress, covered with a white starched apron. And, finally, how good it was three years later as a graduate to wear white–a long-sleeved, knee-length dress with French cuffs. I’d worked very hard to earn wearing white.
That was back in the sixties. I was proud to wear white. I loved looking professional. I didn’t mind the extra laundry. My favorite was made of cotton with a standup collar, short sleeves, and drawstring waist. I bought two, so one would always be clean.
Patients at my hospital knew those of us wearing white with a black stripe on our caps were the registered nurses. The LPNs wore white with a gray stripe on their caps. The aides wore white, but no caps.
Then came the early eighties. The nurses in the hospital where I was working wanted to ditch their caps. An almost sacrilegious request until someone resurrected a study describing the plethora of bacteria that took up residence on nurses’ caps. But if we were to ditch our caps, how would patients know we were the nurses?
The solution? A bright red piece of plastic stating “RN” along the lower edge that served as a backdrop for a picture ID. This pleased the nurses as well as administration and patients. We achieved a smart modern look–I mean, doctors didn’t wear caps, did they? And we had no more worry of bugs tripping off our caps into patients’ wounds or of bed curtains knocking them askew as we squeezed ourselves into small spaces to give our patients their baths.
By the eighties, I was teaching nursing. My uniform changed to a white lab coat over street clothes, attire I’d never dreamed of as a student. Until around that time, the only professionals wearing lab coats were physicians. I guess you could say I’d arrived.
But you may know what happened then to nursing uniforms. Scrubs. Those baggy tops with drawstring pants in all colors, some even in nursery prints–anything to brighten the pediatric patients’ stay and make nurses look more like entertainers than professional caregivers.
In recent years, patients have spoken up. They have so many people coming in and out of their rooms each day, they can’t tell a nurse from an aide from housekeeping from dietary. So some hospitals are adopting a color code. Yes, you read that right. We will be color-coded much like the socks in your drawer or the jumper cables in your trunk. And nurses vary in their enthusiasm about these new uniform policies. Click here and read: Some Nurses Blue Over Color-Coded Uniform Policy.
I’m wondering, have you ever wondered if that “nurse” in your life is really a nurse? And, what do you think nurses should wear? How would you like to see them identified?
Photo credit: VCU Libraries
Write Along with Me 
Lois. I experienced this change as both my mother and my aunt her sister in law were trained nurses. My aunt was trained with the starched whit hats and when nurses had to be virgins. Of corse much of that passed quickly but I’m glad I remember knowing her. My own mother went to school as a 40 year old woman to fulfill a life long dream. I was very o
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I’m on my phone and can’t get to computer. But will comment more on this later.
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I look forward to the rest of your ideas!
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So, Lois, the rest of the history of nurse’s and their attire is so strong in my memory. You portrayed it well. I recently journeyed through a few hospital stays with a now deceased friend of mine, as well as times I’ve attended my own parents deaths in hospitals, I’ve seen the same changes. i agree that some denotion of the position is in order and I think many creative methods have been used. What I notice more than anything is that a level of elite-ism is diminishing and while the risk of losing respect and regard has been real, I generally see that there is more respect and more regard as hospitals work as teams and understand one another’s importance.
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Your observation that caregivers are working more like a team gives me much hope. And that they are showing more respect and understanding of each others’ contributions.The hierarchical nature that has plagued us in the past does appear to be lessening and physicians are becoming better at working collaboratively with nurses, even as nurses have always worked well as team members–we knew we needed each other. Thanks for your input.
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My facility has a “color coding” system for all non-office jobs, and it is a non-issue. At a glance, patients (and staff) know who they are dealing with. Educational material is in each room as a “quick glance guide to the people involved in your care” and it works nicely. Nurses wear blue, dietary wears red, etc.
Also, we only wear solid colors. No goofy unprofessional prints; a policy that I obviously endorse. 🙂
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That sounds so workable. I, like the nurses in the article, would also choose blue. In fact, as a member of several faculties, I helped choose navy or a shade of blue for uniforms for our nursing students. I do wonder why administration would not ask for input before implementing such a policy; that seems like a recipe for some unrest to follow. On another setting, I wish physicians’ offices would have some clearly identifiable system also. But that’s for another time. Thanks for your feedback–I like your term “goofy”!
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I recall a time when I became very frustrated by color coding of uniforms at a time when my mother was quite ill in the hospital. I couldn’t figure out who was who, and was told I could look it up in the booklet they handed out. But I couldn’t keep the booklet in front of me so still couldn’t distinguish between the multitude of personnel and colors that paraded through the room.
As a former pediatric nurse and nursing instructor I lived through a number of uniform color changes, from “starched” white to just wearing street clothes on the unit. As clinical faculty I started out wearing a lab coat over my white uniform (more pockets), then progressed to wearing lab coat over white pants with print top, and finally, in the setting where street clothes were the “uniform,” to lab coat with street clothes. I never was convinced that uniform color or style really made a difference to the children, despite what some research studies stated (they must have been methodologically flawed!). As to caps – I gave mine up in the early 70’s – kept getting knocked off my head by babies, traction, and croupettes. Plus it gave me a headache.
Another issue is name tags – where have they gone and why can’t they state positions when they are worn? I was just in the doctor’s office this morning and the person taking me back had a name tag that read “clinical.” What does that mean??
Sorry to get so long winded.
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I hear you! I responded to another nurse here that doctors’ offices are another problem. And I hate it when friends go to their doctors and then tell me the “nurse” in his or her office told them x y and z. I always ask how they know it was a nurse. They don’t. And I know the system that they go to uses MAs, not nurses. I will blog about this problem soon. I think we retirees are justified in getting long-winded about this–we’ve been there, done that, and more!
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I can’t imagine that nurses could ever go back to starched whites. I think scrubs are functional for the busy, physically challenging jobs nurses do. However, a large name tag indicating the person’s position: RN, LPN, CNA. This needs to be standardized!
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I agree that something needs to be done so we all can instantly know who our caregiver is in all type of health care situations. When I taught psych nursing, it was particularly bad because the nurses wore their name tags flipped over. And because they were wearing street clothes, my students often mistook them for patients until they spotted the badge. I can only imagine the confusion for the patients.
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