Nursing as a medical profession

Introduction

With the types of responsibilities they have in providing care to patients, nurses play a highly important role in the overall medical profession. Nursing is a very difficult career. However, it is regrettable that the most watched TV programs nowadays portray the industry in a completely negative and depressing light. The two television programs, Grey’s Anatomy and House, that have provided the scant information regarding the nursing profession will be reviewed in this review.

Representation of Nurses in Grey’s Anatomy and House

The two popular television programs have represented nurses or the nursing profession as being unimportant. First of all, they all have very few nurse characters, and where these characters appear, they hardly play significant roles in the story. They are given only a few lines (Attanasio et al., 2004). Typically, these two shows give an untrue image of a hospital because they show that the physicians are capable of running the hospitals on their own as they give care to sick patients as the nurses stand and watch in the background or some cases just disappear. In Grey’s Anatomy to be specific, the nurses are only given random spells of lines to speak, and this is only when communicating with a doctor or they only appear in cases where there is a love affair or subplots (Kinderberg et al., 2005). On the other hand, House does not do better even though they have some nurses because the nurses are present on screen only to set the mood of a hospital and in some cases as backdrops (Attanasio et al., 2004).

Unfavorable Portrayal of Nurses

In both cases, the nurses are shown not dressed well. They are sometimes dressed in shaggy attire carrying clipboards, and this is very dominant in Grey’s Anatomy (Kinderberg et al., 2005). Even though in House, the nurse are better dressed but the physicians often overshadow them in looks and attire. Such an image accompanied by the fact that they do a lot of observing roles than acting makes the nursing professionals in the programs look less skilled.

Intellectual Undermining of Nurses

It is also true to say that the nurses in these TV shows are portrayed as less intelligent because the doctors often take up all their roles (Hallam, 2012). Patient teaching, giving medication, triage, provision of psychosocial support and offering constant visits to critically ill patients are roles of nurses that have been granted to physicians in these T.V. shows hence making them look unprofessional and intelligent.

Impact on Perception of Nursing Profession

The demeaning image of nurses that dominates these two TV shows makes them not proper to recommend for a person desiring to enter the nursing profession (Hallam, 2012). Therefore, I would not recommend these shows for people interested in nursing.

Comparison with Johnson & Johnson Videos

When compared to Johnson & Johnson Videos, the two favorite shows give a direct contrast to what Johnson & Johnson videos portray of nurses. Their videos represent something helpful and positive about nursing. Moreover, the nurses in these videos offer constant emotional support to their patients (Video Archeology, 2011). In overall, they give nurses key positions and critical roles to play. However, still, the Johnson and Johnson videos fall short with giving the nurses the professional image that they out to have. According to Hallam (2012), the videos still portray nurses as the low- skilled angels. So that in as much as the nurses are seen as important and playing a critical role in the entire video, they are still not pictured as professionals.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, the media has given the image of nurses as unskilled, unprofessional and insignificant in the entire medical field. Such images are dominant in the popular television shows like Grey’s Anatomy and House. However, there are some media that tend to revive the nursing profession by giving nurses the significant role that they play in patient care such as the Johnson &Johnson videos.

Reference

Attanasio P., et al., (2004). House. Heel and Toe Films, Shore Z Productions, Bad Hat Harry Productions, NBC Universal Television Studio & Universal Media Studio. Video

Hallam J., (2012). Nursing The Image: Media Culture and Professional Identity. New York. U.S.A. Print.

Kinderberg A., et al, (2005). Grey’s Anatomy. The Mark Gordon Company. U.S.A. Video

Video Archeology, (2011) Johnson &Johnson Nursing Recruitment. Videoarcheology.com. Video. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cy1GRSCvVz0 on 22nd March, 2017.