Aibu to want to leave nursing because people are so fucking rude!!!

[Rabs6]

Iv been nursing for 11 years, worked hard for my nursing degree and am currently studying for my masters. Bare minimum I do about 2hours a week of continuing learning just to keep up to date with what's going on in my field.
Im good at my job and have lots of knowledge.

The problem I have with my job isn't the pay or the hours it's the fact that about 70% of the patients I see or their families are fucking horrible!! At least every day I get spoken to like shit from at least one person I'm trying to help and I'm so sick of it!!
In what other job would you work so hard to have such little respect? And why do so many people feel its OK to use their nurse as an emotional punch bag!!!

@Infullbloom - that's interestimg because my vet, the nurses and the reception staff are unequivocally helpful and delightful. It is a joy to visit and it saddens me that people looking after animals are so helpful and so thorough and so gentle bit those looking after humans are not.

that's interestimg because my vet, the nurses and the reception staff are unequivocally helpful and delightful

As are my colleagues. Unfortunately the same can't be said for a minority of clients. Its particularly bad at the moment as we cannot offer our normal service due to restrictions and people are angry about that. Did you not know that a cat nail clip is an absolutely emergency.

I am appalled by this behaviour TBH! People are very rude and ignorant IMO .Have been in Hospital as well several times .Staff have always been very kind and I am very grateful to them all.Maybe people are under stress (no excuse I know)and may speak out of turn sometimes ?It seems very sad to think a dedicated Nurse has to think of resigning her post due to complete twats!

When i asked where the toilets were on my work experience in hospital, i took a qrong tirn and got shouted at by the sonographer for not listening as though i was a naughty two year old!!

Wrong turn sorry!!

Tbh the NHS is pretty shit. So if you regularly interact with people dealing with a shit organisation they're not going to be too friendly towards you. Especially when the shitness results in something more than than misdelivered parcels and inconvenience but can and does involve pain, life limitations and death. Due to the NHS being the only health service available to most, and due to it being shit, most people have experience of negative interaction with it. So every time you are a bit dismissive, don't pay attention, don't act as quick as you might, the person witnessing this is immediately back in the mindset they were when their/their family member's emergency/condition was ignored or misdiagnosed.

I mean, I get that it's stressful, but neither you nor the patient can fix that. So it's either change your circumstance or change your response.

Unfortunately dealing with rude people is in every walk of life now. NHS patients, pupil’s parents in schools, customers, I’ve worked with the military, civil servants and in banking and there are dickhead colleagues everywhere!

It's shit op. Any job meeting members of the public generally means being spoken to badly- even though it shouldn't.

Awful when it's people you're trying to help though.

Colleagues in offices are often unpleasant too - in a different way. Passive aggressive behaviour and bullying.

Most people are dickheads really.

@rumblingtumtum

I get it. I've been a police officer for nearly 20 years. Am now actively looking for a new job because I'm fed up of the constant shit and negativity we get from the public the media and the government. I work long hard hours to try and do my best for people in their worst times but the constant slating is very waring.

Just wanted to say that I had a very good experience with the police recently. I was bitten by a dog and it was taken seriously and dealt with swiftly, focussing on ensuring the outcome was what I wanted. I made it very clear how pleased I was with this when I got a "customer satisfaction" phone call afterwards. That said, I don't blame you for wanting to leave. I couldn't do your job for all the tea in China, and that's even before thinking about the rudeness and negativity. I'll stick with teaching teenagers

I don't watch programmes like Holby or Casualty because although they aren't documentarties , people will watch a medical 'drama' and see over and over the 'patients' being rude to the 'staff' and they just stand there

"Are you even old enough" "Do you know what you're doing" "When am I going to get seen" "What's happening/what's wring" when they've only just wheeled them in and "She is going to be ok" (statement not question)

I know it isn't Real Life its just Telly but it irks me .

Personally , I've had to deal with a few rude patients but yes the family can be worse .

A couple of spectacularly rude older men.
Turning up hours early expecting to be "fitted in because I have a hospital appointment" .
The hospital appointment may have been short notice but our dates are booked 6 weeks in advance . So time to re-arrange not just assume that everyone else will accomodate . Unpleasant and unclean.

But I think , at least I don't live with you and I don't have to be you .

It's actuallly more fun to be unnervingly polite ( but not overly nice , I don't LoveBomb them) and see them twisting themselves into knots trying to get a rise when I won't respond to that .

Roll on retirement eh?

@Burton94

I don’t blame you for wanting to quit, I nearly quit for the same reason over lockdown. The public are horrible, and despite the suggestions here they shouldn’t be talking to you like that even if they think you’re doing something wrong. They should follow the proper complaint channels and discuss it reasonably not fly off the handle. I think this is why the Karen meme happened, I know the use of the name is controversial, but it is usually middle class, middle aged men and women shouting about pointless, trivial things, that they think they know best about. I didn’t quit but I’ve vowed to step in where I see people shouting at employees. Next time I see it in a shop or anywhere I’m not staying quiet. Oh and to the teachers... the nurses, police and people in shops etc have won this one. You aren’t the most hard done by

That was going really well until you had to include a snide comment about whinghing teachers... Show me actual evidence of teachers claiming they have it harder than everyone else. Yes, that's what I thought...

Ive worked in shops and been a teacher and now train for nhs. Teaching is definately the most stressful...sorry.

@LookToTreblesGoingTreblesGone

Any role involving working with the public can be horrible. People can be so nasty and rude.

I worked in a library which people generally think is a lovely calming place to work. Not so. I lost count of the times I was told to fuck off, or called a cunt. In a library of all places!

You have my sympathy and I don't blame you for having had enough.

Me too...I’ve had to call the police for an assault on a colleague in the library I work in...he was a male but it’s usually the female staff who get the abuse, usually from men. And when you stand up to them and ask them to stop, it escalates beyond belief....We have security guards now and things have calmed down a lot.

I feel for you OP. My mum is in nursing and she is bloody good at it, very caring and compassionate. Most people she cares for and their families are lovely, but there are a significant minority who aren't. She has been both verbally and physically abused over the years

The police, I feel also have an awful time of it.

As a teacher, I have been on the receiving end of abuse from some parents (thankfully a minority).

Restaurant/retail/ambulance staff are others I can think of that suffer abuse from the people they serve.

I don't know what the answer is - some people just don't seem to conisder the affect their behaviour has on others.

In what other job would you work so hard to have such little respect?

Anything to do with childcare or education. I’ve been spoken to by parents appallingly and told that I’m a glorified babysitter... No

Glorified babysitter
These parents are honestly just too much
Honestly wtaf

@TheKarenWhoKnocks I hope you or your family don't have to use the NHS if that's how you feel about it

I was a ward nurse although retired now due to health but I totally agree with you. If I had stayed I think I would have gone into theatres. I loved my job at the start but got sick of being treated like crap by patients, relatives and management.

Have you thought about going on the immunisation team going around schools? Also if or when the Covid vaccine appears they will need nurses for that.

Lol @princessspotify ofc we have to use the NHS, same as pretty much everyone. That's why I feel sad/frustrated/angry (depending on circumstance/outcome) that it's so shit.

I mean, maybe if people had a choice, they wouldn't get so riled. As it is, on encountering an eye-roll or an otherwise dismissive or indeed incompent attitude, having experienced such before and suffered the effects, it's either put up and shut up or make a fuss. It's not like with an energy provider with poor service: there is no other provision.

Whoever said it cant be 80% of patients that are rude, obviously that was a guess but honestly its every day.
Weve had a nurse assaulted, weve had threats where security had to escort us to our cars at the end of a shift. Someone had a glass bottle of baby milk thrown at them.
I've been called a stupid little girl, I'm over 50😆
Weve had parents make nurses cry, parents that demand their baby has x treatment straight away. Weve had parents threatened to take their babies home when the baby is in an incubator.
Honestly I wouldn't believe how bad it was unless I saw it!

I genuinely think the general public are getting worse. I’ve started talking back. I’m there to help people not take your entitled crap

A (young female) patient threatened to gouge one of my nursing colleague's eyes out, as the nurse wasnt able to get a doctor to speak to her immediately when she demanded it. Appalling. You do wonder how these types must have been raised.

Hell is other people!