Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay

Today, most people perceive nursing as a women profession. Men who enter this field have been looked at as outcasts. Many individuals feel that a man does not belong in a “feminine? profession. I believe that statement to be untrue and unfair. The issue of gender discrimination in nursing is the same as other professions. The only difference is nursing is dominated by women, and men are the minority fighting for equality.

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Gender or sex discrimination involves treating an employee or a class of employees differently because of gender. Whenever this discrimination affects the terms or conditions of employment, it is illegal. Gender-based disparate treatment of employees with regard to pay, title, position, hours worked and vacation time is generally considered illegal and morally wrong. Just 2.7 percent of the working nurse population in the United States are men. To understand why nursing is dominated by women we have to examine the it?s history. Male nurses may belong, but there?s still not many around. According to the U.S. Labor Department statistics, “6.7 percent of registered nurses were male”(statistics). Gender discrimination in nursing exists because of prejudices male students encounter in the classroom, in the workplace and with the patients. Over the years discrimination of males in the nursing has declined but just like racial discrimination it still exist.Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay

We all have been victims of gender bias, whether in the academic fields; our roles at home; or even in the clothes we chose to wear. This problem is not something that came up recently, rather it’s an issue that has been ongoing for centuries. As a child, if you are a girl, you wear pink clothes with flowers and play with Barbie dolls. A little boy on the other hand, wears blue and walks around with toy cars and video game controllers. Before we can choose our goals, we are assigned specific gender roles and career paths according to our sex. Nursing is one of those fields oriented mostly towards females, despite all the advancements made in gender equality; a male nurse is still frowned upon. According to the textbook, nursing originates…show more content…
One of those men was called the knight hospitalers, which is where the word hospital originated. During the civil war, “Although we only hear about the predominantly female Union Volunteer nurses, the confederate army assigned 30 men in each regiment to take care for the injured. This could have been the start to the modern combat today” says Lucas. He continues to explain that military nursing was predominantly male until the turn of the century when female nursing schools organized their annual meeting in New York City and excluded men from nursing in the military. Hence forth only women were allowed to serve as nurses in the Army Nurse Corps, which was formed in 1901. Lucas proclaims that it was not until after the Korean War, that men began flowing back into the military’s nursing program. Even after decades, not much has changed regarding men in this specific career path. When we see movies like “meet the parents” in which the father in law constantly makes fun of Ben Stiller for being a male nurse when he clearly loves his job doesn’t seem to be fair. It is interesting to note that women today have taken positions in programs such as engineering, medicine, and law. However, they are not talked about as much as men in nursing field. Although females continue to exceed men as nurses significantly, the stats of male nurses have increased. The document “Men in nursing occupations” by liana Christian Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay

using the topic Gender Wage Discrimination:
-analyze the relationship among culture, diversity & self by investigating their influence on nursing.
-discuss approaches for determining how issues of diversity affect modern societies in personal and nursing profession contexts
-recommend strategies to overcome obstacles in diversity to meet personal & professional goals
-assess challenges of overcoming issues in diversity through the incorporation of diverse perspectives and view points informed by relevant literature.
-Use an even in diversity through the lens of history, humanities, natural & applied sciences and social studies & how this event has or has not influenced modern society
-Explain how ingegrating the four lenses helps people to understand how problems in diversity impact others professionally and personally
-analyze how social practices have been shaped by issues and events in diversity in modern culture
-asses benefits and challenges in addressing issues in diversity
-explain how analyzing diversity can help with interactions with those of different view points, cultures Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay
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The nursing profession has not been immune from gender inequality. Because the profession remains predominantly female, the way nurses are treated in a particular society often reflects how women are treated. Sadly, in the media, nurses are often portrayed as embodying feminine stereotypes: low-skilled handmaidens, sex objects, angels, or battle-axes. The news media still tends to focus on physicians’ work and to discount nurses’ clinical and research achievements. In many television dramas, physicians, who are often male characters, receive the credit for meaningful healthcare, whilst the mostly female nurse characters meekly assist, displaying no autonomy and little skill. Such characters may reflect creators’ attempts to provide comic relief or meet ethnic diversity goals with minimal effort. And of course, the male physician leads look more heroic when seen next to deferential female nurses. Even “progressive” programming that features female physician characters and may even include male nurses tends to reflect the same assumptions, with the added gender stereotype that men in nursing are gay or weak. Advertising still exploits the “naughty nurse” image, suggesting that nurses exist mainly to provide sex to patients or physicians. The media has often reinforced these misconceptions of nursing in global society.Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay

Nursing should challenge these misconceptions. Nurse Sandy Summers is a leading advocate for nurses and is the founder and executive director of the international nonprofit organisation ‘The Truth About Nursing,’ which challenges stereotypes and educates the world about the value of nursing. Sandy has worked tirelessly since 2001 to encourage accurate presentations of the profession and to confront the media regarding misportrayals of nurses on many occasions. The Truth About Nursing also maintains a vast website with analyses of nursing in the media and it has engaged in many global advocacy campaigns. As a result of its work, numerous programmes and advertising campaigns have changed. Gender Bias in Nursing Profession Essay