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Static Thought: Why don’t nurses wear capes?

The superheroes I grew up with all wore capes…fighting evil villains or standing heroically on top of buildings while the nonsensical piece of fabric attached to their neck flapped in the breeze.

I thought about this as I walked out of a hospital this past Saturday evening after a 16-hour double shift – legs aching, mentally and physically exhausted and ready to drive home and collapse in a heap on my bed. A class I’m taking requires me to spend a certain number of hours in hospital emergency rooms practicing patient assessments and other skills we’ve learned under the supervision of nurses, so when I showed up to my first shift Saturday morning I’d been assigned my first of many nurses to shadow behind in the hopes that I would learn something that day.

I did learn, although much of what I learned was the result of seeing what goes on behind the scene in emergency rooms, and leaves me with the simple question: why don’t nurses wear capes?

It’s not that I didn’t get anything out of my clinical experience in terms of strengthening my skills – I did, in spades – but at the end of the day it wasn’t what stuck with me. I thought back through my day, countless patients and interactions, and I thought about what the bullet points would be for the lessons I’d learned that day.

Firstly, I learned that nurses are apparently bladderless. The nurses I shadowed on Saturday all went far longer without excusing themselves to use the facilities than us mere mortals. They continued to consume drinks in short bursts – grabbing their coffee mugs after leaving a room and taking a brief sip before running off to another room – yet I can only assume that any byproduct from it is excreted via smiling, which they seemed to do a lot.

Secondly, nurses apparently do not require food. I followed numerous nurses on Saturday, and I did not see any of them consume any food, nor complain about being hungry. However I did see them bring crackers or food to patients that requested something to eat prior to taking a medication or undergoing a procedure…always after a brisk walk to a cafeteria that seemed like it was a quarter mile away from their station.

Thirdly, nurses are always doing something. If you’re a patient, when a nurse enters your room, smiles, introduces yourself and talks to you about why you’re visiting that day, although from your end it only seems like they’re being friendly, they’ve already accomplished half a dozen tasks and are working on half a dozen more. Normal people often have trouble doing math in their head while even nodding along with a conversation, but nurses are not normal people. They’re counting respirations, ticking through possibilities for conditions to rule out, hooking up blood pressure cuffs and assessing a variety of different items while cheerfully discussing the weather.

Lastly, nurses are unwaveringly nice. People don’t go to hospitals when they’re feeling great. They go when they’re in pain, or when they’re feeling sick, or both. When I’m feeling that way, I’m not usually the nicest person in the world, and many people in hospitals are the same way. So when a nurse comes in and asks questions for information – much of which has to be verified multiple times to ensure the safety of any procedures or medications given – patients can get angry and lash out. Surprisingly, though, as patients gets angrier, nurses get nicer. They smile, they act compassionate and they try harder to make the patient feel better. I learned on Saturday that it is nearly impossible to anger or rattle a nurse.

I left my first day of clinicals with a great deal of knowledge and confidence in my skills, but more than that, I left with more respect for a job that is harder than most others I’ve seen done by people that make it look like the easiest thing on earth.

Superman, Superwoman, Batman and other fictitious superheroes wear capes as they run around fighting crime and making their cities a better place, yet nurses do not. As I climbed into my car, started it up and began wiping the several inches of snow off my windshield, I came to the conclusion that they must have them, but must only use them on days when things are slow.

So, the next time you see a nurse, use that as your measuring stick – if he or she is not wearing a cape, they’re likely hungry, have a full bladder, haven’t stopped moving since before you woke up, but are still going to treat you like royalty. If they are wearing a cape, then they’re not busy. And, a nurse that’s not busy is similar to a caped, flying superhero in one major way…they don’t exist.