By Doctor George Jacob
Kochi, May 14, 2020: We observed the ‘International Nurses Day’ on May12, the birth anniversary of Florence Nightingale, ‘the lady with the lamp.”
For a day, nurses became the focus of much attention. Their efficiency and qualities like dedication, practical finesse, and discipline make them worthy successors of. Resultantly, they are known by numerous superlative synonyms that speak highly of their quality — ‘angels in white,’ ‘smiling angels,’ and ‘goddesses in white.’
Nurses from India, especially those from the southern state of Kerala, have been much sought after within the country and abroad.
It is time to check if these ‘smiling angels’ are really smiling behind their masks, which have recently been made mandatory as the Coronavirus continues its stranglehold on the world.
The pandemic has drawn the best out of nurses, there is no doubt. They continue to toil shoulder-to-shoulder with a large gamut of healthcare personnel, as they have always done in the past during numerous wars, epidemics, natural and manmade disasters.
The International Council of Nurses had chosen ‘Nursing the world to Health,’ as the theme for this year’s International Nurses Day.
But, in India, the theme needs to be reframed as ‘Nursing the nursing to respectability,’ simply because, Indian nurses are called upon to function as compassionate, empathetic, hardworking ‘smiling angels in white,’ tending to the suffering and the sick, despite many a hurdle. Odds against them are numerous and daunting.
Their abysmal working conditions are incongruent to the responsibilities they’re called to shoulder. Hospital managements, to ‘cut costs,’ refuse to replace nurses who leave work. As a result they are overworked and often called upon to do extra hours.
Their work culture has seen a sea-change lately. In these days of hospitals vying for various accreditation merely to embellish their hoardings, demands on nurses to document have increased by many folds. They are, as part of ‘documentation,’ required to ‘treat’ patient files, and maintain irrelevant registers, much more than they contribute to treatment of patients.
Despite this, they are lowly paid. The unfortunate turn of events that had these ‘angels in white’ take to the streets of Kerala, not too long ago demanding reasonable emoluments is indelibly etched to memory.
It is common to find nurses in work places being treated as doormats. Being shouted at by doctors, who bark orders and ‘reprimands’ during rounds, before patients they are to care for, is common place. Their superiors like Nursing Superintendents and Supervisors, who are supposed to stand up for their cause, much often than not turn them down by adopting stances and supporting policies much against their welfare to win favor of hospital managements.
The latter, by confiscating their certificates and having them sign on dotted lines unfavorable clauses and terms and conditions that run incongruent to their welfare and interests, make them a captive workforce, who are frustrated, underpaid, overworked, and yet having to shoulder huge responsibility to deliver healthcare with aplomb, dignity and respectability.
Nurses of today, unlike those of yesteryears don the white coat, goaded by parental and family pressure. Families and parents eyeing fat paychecks drawn by nurses abroad, make ‘geese that lay golden eggs’ out of them, often against their free will. Parents don’t think twice about sending their daughters to war-ravaged Iraq, terrorist-infested Syria and countries torn asunder by political unrest like Yemen and Libya as nurses.
Responsibility to repay loans families avail from banks for their outrageously expensive nursing courses offered by private ‘nursing colleges’ fall on the already-burdened shoulders of young nursing graduates. Nurses’ families and parents expect them to contribute to refurbish or even construct homes, and help in marrying off siblings.
The very calling to nursing as a profession therefore remains sullied, and strenuous. Nurses working abroad, who are handsomely paid, are a much-sought after commodity in the ‘marriage market.’ They are often compelled to take on the responsibilities of family life even before they actually settle down.
The yoke of Life that nurses are called to shoulder must be made much lighter, and their conditions of work vastly improved if they are to function in keeping with the dignity and honor their profession demands and are expected. They deserve to be paid well, and adequately rested between shifts with adequate staff numbers.
They expect their superiors to represent them and their woes, than those of their employers. They deserve to be treated with much greater dignity and respect, especially by doctors and hospital managements. Their families must contribute by substantially easing responsibilities placed on their young shoulders, right from the commencement of their profession as nurses.
Hospitals must mete out amenities such as adequate duty rooms, canteen facilities, and facilities like creches, which will contribute to their efficiency and undistracted dedication, by taking substantial load off their overburdened shoulders.