Written by As you may have guessed from my name I am a male nurse. Over the years there have been many representations of male nurses on TV and in the movies.
My earliest memory is of a male nurse on TV was probably Michael on “A Country Practice” who from what I can remember of the show seemed to do a decent job in representing male nurses as it was back in the eighties (or was it the seventies)?
No offence to the fans that keep this show on air but I personally dislike immensely the Aussie show “All Saints” as it has metamorphosed so much I don’t recognise it anymore…so as I don’t watch it I can’t comment on its cast of male nurses. Maybe you can bring me up to speed if you think they are accurately represented or not?
My 11 year old son loves the TV show “Scrubs” but they seem to have only done one episode that I could find that covered the stereo-types of male nurses. In that episode some of the doctor characters mock the male nurse’s character as doing “women’s work” but fortunately the episodes overall representation of the character playing a male nurse is that he is smart, witty, secure, and fearless.
I did laugh when I saw “Meet the Parents” where Ben Stiller plays “Gaylord Focker” and how his Father-in-Law played by Robert DeNiro whose character plays a retired CIA agent who struggles with the perceived lack of masculinity in his Son-In-Laws chosen profession of nursing.
I am sure there are many female and male nurses who have been shocked or disappointed with how they have been portrayed over the years in the movies and on TV. I suppose for me personally I don’t take the TV shows and movie portrayals too seriously, after all it’s only a TV show or a movie its not real life.
The good news is that if by chance you do take offence at how a nurse’s role has been portrayed there is always the internet where you now have a voice and can jump onto a blog like ours and start a thread to check how other nurses felt about the same portrayal. If there was a growing groundswell of negative feedback coming out of a blog the media would take note as this is often how mainstream stories in the media start and such how our opinions can be heard.
So to finish with a laugh, check this out…get your kids (or colleagues) a “Male Nurse Action Figure” today! I love the synopsis of this “action figure” I found on the web… http://www.epartyunlimited.com/male-nurse-action-figure.html
“Armed with a stethoscope and a clipboard holding an X-ray, this 5-1/4″ (13.3 cm) tall, hard vinyl Male Nurse Action Figure is ready to treat your symptoms and fix what ails you.
Male nurses make up six percent of the nurses in the United States and only slightly more in Australia and the UK, but this number is growing. These men are blazing the trail as role models and mentors for generations to come. Thank a male nurse today!”
What do you think, do the actors and script writers that have been representing us nurses been doing a good job on the big and small screen? What is the best and worst example you have seen?
Rich