With nursing being thought of as a female oriented career and comprised of mostly females, have you as a male nursing student(or someone that has observed and knows) had any issues going through nursing school or in your career as a graduated nurse
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I have absolutely seen males working as nurses. Actually, I just graduated with a ADN and about 10/90 of my classmates were male. From what I have observed, males tend to be well respected in the field of nursing. Furthermore, the administrators at our school gave preference to enter males into clinicals early because there is supposed to be an increased demand for males in the nursing profession.
Since I am female, I can’t tell you first hand if there are special issues with being a male nursing student/nurse. But I am one of those people who believes that there are up sides and down sides to just about everything.
Nursing school is difficult. I think it was not only academically challenging and time consuming, but emotionally trying as well. I would advise any nursing student to ‘stay on their toes’ at all times and keep up the fight… it’s worth it in the end. Good luck!
I went to school with about 10 male students (in my class of 120). They were great guys who were smart and talented and to my knowledge they had no issues getting through which had anything to do with gender. The male nurses I worked with in the past have always been treated as equals, they are not treated any better or any worse. Obviously there are always ignorant people in the world who, when you tell them you’re a nurse, will make snide comments or assumptions (like, male nurses are always gay, for example) because of the fact that it’s largely considered a female profession. But if you let those kinds of things get to you, you probably don’t have a thick enough skin to be a nurse in the first place.
People will tell you that male nurses might get used more often for the more physical tasks of nursing. . . like if a patient needs moving, you might end up being the go-to guy for help. But honestly, in most GOOD facilities in the US, there are standards for safe patient movement and transfers and you’re really supposed to be using lifting equipment when it’s available to you, you should not be lifting much weight anyway.
Also, I just want to emphasize to never call yourself a ‘male nurse’. It’s kind of stupid to be using your gender as part of your title, as though your gender makes you different or special compared to a regular ‘nurse’ who happens to be female. It’s really frowned upon in the professional environment to refer to yourself as a ‘male nurse’. You will be a nurse, and you will happen to be male. No need to point out the obvious. Just sayin’. 🙂
Source(s): RN