nurses could not do EKGs or draw blood or start an IV. I started work as the night nurse in charge of the ER. One of the Medical Residents taught me how to do each. Not even the staff docs ever complained or told any one; they were just happy to see that EKG when they entered the room or to have me drawing blood or starting an IV while they were doing more important exams.
In 1965 when I was in basic training for the Army Nurse Corp, there was a special class to teach blood drawing and hanging an IV, as only 5 of us knew how.
Not until I joined the Army did I have someone else giving out the bedpans, taking VS, giving baths and doing all the other scut work as we had no nurses aides.
The only computer we had was our brain ( I hated figuring out drops per minute for IVs), We had to remember every thing done for a patient and print it in their chart.
Starched white uniforms, caps that left sores on your head - I was the first nurse in our hospital (1962) to wear white pants to work and had to report to the Nursing Director's office with the hospital's Administrator in attendance - they were not happy! Told them that they could fire me but I was tired of fighting off drunks, mental patients and dirty old men trying to reach under my skirt. A notice went out that afternoon that pants were allowed.
Today, at 86 yo, my PCP is a NP and I love her. She has recently written a letter stating that I am in my 'right mind' as I am writing a new holographic Last Will and Testament and will need that to show the court on my passing.
I am so proud of the nursing profession, what it was and what it is now (It took a lot of hard work from all of us) and what it can become. My own mentor graduated from nursing in 1902 and I now sponsor nursing students at our Comm. College as I want a good nurse when I am 97 yo.!!!
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