Buddy Sledge, a nurse at Shepherd Center, checks the breathing and heart sounds of patient Clay Logue. Sledge started a second career in nursing after teaching history at the college level for 10 years.
In the movie "Meet the Fockers," Ben Stiller's character is a nurse who is forced to put up with a barrage of insults about his profession's supposed lack of manliness. Stereotypes about male nurses may still persist in the movies, but they are rapidly changing in the health care field.
Men have been nurses since at least 250 B.C., when the first nursing school, which accepted only male students, was established in India. In the United States, men accounted for 5.4 percent of the registered nurses in 2000, but recent U.S. Department of Labor surveys and nursing school enrollments show that the numbers have climbed to almost 7 percent and are expected to increase.
Men represent an untapped worker base that could help ease the nursing shortage. Recent recruitment campaigns with slogans such as "Looking for a few good men" or "Are you man enough to be a nurse?" are attracting more men to a career that promises good pay, job stability, flexible hours, varied workplaces and tremendous opportunities for advancement.
With more women taking jobs in male-
dominated fields and more men teaching school or staying home with their children, traditional gender boundaries of careers have blurred. While some of the old prejudices still exist — men are still less welcome in labor and delivery units — nursing has changed, and this might be the best time for men to consider entering the profession.
"I don't get raised eyebrows from people when I tell them I'm a nurse," said Buddy Sledge, BSN, RN, who works in the spinal cord injury unit at Shepherd Center in Atlanta. "People say: 'Oh, where do you work?'
"Of course, I have a doctorate in history and taught college for 10 years, so my friends get a kick out of calling me 'Dr. Nurse.' "
Bored with teaching, Sledge was ready to do something different and had always been interested in medicine. He was accepted into the accelerated nursing program at Kennesaw State University, where 10 of the 40 students in the class were men.
"I won't lie and say that I loved every minute of nursing school. It's tougher than you think, but by the time you learn that, you're already hooked on it," Sledge said. "Nursing is a great career, and it's a more science-based, evidence-based practice than it was 40 to 50 years ago, with nurses involved in the research, which makes it very exciting."
Sledge, who works with teenage patients who have had debilitating accidents, finds his rehabilitation role "messy, fun, exciting and inspiring."
"What I like best is the one-on-one contact with patients and their families," Sledge said. "It's a tough thing for an athletic 18-year-old to face a traumatic injury. It's a scary time. They have psychological, body image, bowel and bladder, and sexuality issues. Some are more comfortable talking with a male nurse.
"When you can be there, be reliable and tell them that others have gone through it and that it will be OK, then you feel like you're making a difference in someone's life."
Career change
Sal Jamshidi, BSN, is a nurse at Grady Memorial Hospital's intensive care and postoperative care units. He also works in long-term care at Emory Healthcare's Wesley Woods Center.
A former civil engineer, Jamshidi was interested in nursing, but the gender stereotyping of the profession kept him from exploring the field for several years. But once Jamshidi observed the job up close, he knew he would like it.
Jamshidi saw that nurses weren't just carrying out orders from doctors and that their skills made a difference in patient outcomes.
"Being an engineer, I like the technology and critical thinking skills of ICU. You have to stay a couple of steps ahead of your patient, or you get into trouble," Jamshidi said. "The challenge in nursing is always there, and you become much better at seeing the signs of what's really going on as you gain experience.
"There's a lot of internal satisfaction in being able to help heal people. It was the best decision for me."
Jamshidi said that men and women communicate differently in the workplace, but he sees both genders working together for a common goal. "You always need people to help you — people you can trust — so friendships are more meaningful and very important in this job."
Wealth of opportunities
Getting to work with "a bunch of smart people" is one of the things that John Lee, RN, likes best about his job in the intensive care unit at WellStar Kennestone Hospital in Marietta. Health care was his first career choice, but he had to think twice before choosing nursing.
"The field is not as female-dominated as it used to be, and when I'm working, I don't even think about it," Lee said.
Lee also sees the many opportunities that exist in the field.
"ICU gives you a great platform to do other things. I plan to stay with it for at least another 18 months and learn all I can, but I might like to try open heart [surgery]," Lee said.
He has been pleasantly surprised by the positive reaction of patients, most of whom don't care that he's a man.
"Some of the [male] patients seem to prefer it, and my female colleagues tell me guys get more respect from the patients and the doctors," Lee said. "I just know that, when I'm with my patients, I demand a certain amount of respect, and I give it in return."
Men in nursing stand out, acknowledged David Bennett, Ph.D., RN, assistant dean of the WellStar School of Nursing at Kennesaw State University. "If you're good, you get noticed, and if you're bad, you get noticed," he said.
That's just part of the territory when you're in a female-dominated field, he said, but in his 31 years of nursing, Bennett has seen many changes.
"I was majoring in biology and didn't know what I'd be able to do with it, but I was working part time in a hospital and met a couple of male nurses. My aunt was also a nurse, and they all convinced me that nursing was a career that combined science and caring for people — one where I could make a decent salary. It turned out to be a good fit," Bennett said.
He liked the challenge of working in the emergency room, where things happened quickly, but Bennett later discovered that he had a talent for teaching while he was instructing nursing students on clinical rotations. As a nursing dean, he's in a great position to show male students the many possibilities in the field.
"Back when I started, nurses didn't have as much responsibility, and patients weren't as sick," he said. "There were fewer career opportunities, but I'm so glad I did it. Once you're a nurse, you're always a nurse.
"Now I see our graduates do so many interesting things. The sky's the limit when it comes to job opportunities. I tell my students that they are entering a great career where they'll never stop learning."
Learning on the job
Mike Lucas, BSN, works in the neuroscience unit at Northside Hospital in Atlanta. He likes the fact that nurses can change jobs without having to change careers, and he's thinking about becoming a nurse practitioner after he gains more experience.
"The vastness of this field is amazing," he said. "I didn't want to be a floor nurse, but I did my preceptorship on this floor and discovered I liked this kind of nursing.
"The team gave me good support and made it an easy transition. There is always someone I can go to for help."
Lucas has spent his first year on the job learning the difference between textbook and real nursing.
"It's amazing how hard you work," he said.
Because Lucas is so task-oriented, he has a tough time believing that he can be on the job more than 12 hours and not get everything done. But he likes his three-day schedule and the opportunity to pick up overtime shifts if he wants the extra money. Mostly, he enjoys the challenge of seeing something new at work every day.
"The piece I like best is connecting with patients," he said. "It's not just about skills but about making someone feel cared for."
Helping people get through some of the worst times of their lives proves to Sledge that he's doing something important.
"In the final analysis, you know that, in nursing, you're making an impact beyond your own life," he said. "At the end of the day, I think that's what men and women want."