Skills wanted, strength even more:
But training is only training. Not a single male nurse has selected obstetrics upon becoming a full-fledged nurse. For starters, they don't have a lot of interest in obstetrics, and the field isn't yet really willing to accept male nurses. In obstetrics, it is feared that male doctors and male nurses would only add to the patients' anxieties.
Chang Pao-chu holds that units for serious illness, such as intensive care wards, operating rooms and mental wards, require greater strength, making the most of male nurses' special qualities. These are the places most suitable for them to work.
Whether out of necessity or discrimination, almost all of the men who are nurses now work in units dealing with serious illnesses. Operating rooms, emergency clinics, intensive care wards, and psychiatry, cardiology and osteology departments are places where you're most likely to see a male nurse.
Lin Hung-hsin chose to work in the intensive care ward of a neurology department, which is sarcastically known as the "gold room" (because nurses must clean up feces, which in Chinese are thought of as being golden in color). True, because many of the patients have lost sensation in and control over their bodies, the work takes a lot out of nurses. They've got to turn patients over, sponge them down, wipe them off, feed them and even clean up after they go to the bathroom. But the work also provides lots of challenges.
"Brain surgery patients may be confused and unclear about things," Lin Hung-hsin says. "But the state of their illness changes quickly." Nurses must carefully observe the patients, evaluating the care they are providing and planning future care for the patient. Never letting their guard down, they must also keep the doctors informed of the patients' conditions.
A symbiotic relationship:
Physical differences and diverging social expectations make men and women fundamentally different. Even if nursing is theoretically a gender-neutral occupation, male and female nurses perform differently.
Some people believe that male nurses are too rough and cannot care for their patients as considerately as female nurses. But a nurse's work doesn't end with being thoughtful. Demands placed on a nurse vary from unit to unit. "Working in an emergency room is all about saving lives," says Chang Heng, director of the emergency room at Hsin Kong Wu Ho-su Memorial Hospital, "and so speedy reactions and strength are more important there than being thoughtful."
Chen Mei-yun also points out that in psychiatric wards the nurses' capabilities--and not their kindness and patience--is of greatest importance.
Lin Hung-hsin is that unit's only male nurse. Although they downplay his gender, in the eyes of his supervisor Chang Wei-chin, his performance still differs from his female colleagues.
Chang Wei-chin believes that Lin Hung-hsin, compared to his female colleagues, is more interested in medical technology and less interested in caring for patients. Most female nurses, for example, only help doctors stick tubes into their own patients, whereas Lin, whether the patient is his or not, comes to help as soon as a doctor starts attaching them.
In accordance with Lin Hung-hsin's own experiences, he has discovered that the biggest difference between male and female nurses is that male nurses are more inclined to try to solve a problem themselves, whereas female nurses are more likely to run quickly for a doctor.
Thunderbolt Angels:
Of course, genderpolarized stereotypes shouldn't be used to judge the performance of nurses. Nevertheless, the greater physical strength of male nurses is indeed one of the main reasons hospitals are so enamored of them.
At the end of September an emergency squad of male nurses at Hsin Kong Memorial will formally hit the road. Chang Heng, the director of the emergency room at the hospital who thought up and promoted the idea of the squad, says that the 1-1-9 ambulance drivers are fire fighters and not emergency health care personnel.
Chang Heng believes that male nurses are best suited for the job. "Men are stronger than women and generally bolder," Chang points out. In scenes of disaster such as fires or car accidents, when bodies are covered with soot or blood, not everyone can keep his--or, more to the point, her -- cool. Male nurses may be just what the doctor ordered.
Chang Heng hopes that Hsin Kong's "Thunderbolt" squad will serve as a model for other hospitals. In this way, it will not only raise the quality of emergency medical services, it will also provide male nurses with another way of putting their abilities to use.
From Candles to Flashlights:
The shortage of nurses is a serious problem with no signs of improvement. Irregular hours and low pay are most frequently cited to explain why the nursing profession hasn't been able to attract and hold people.
But starting salaries for nurses are not low--close to NT$30,000 a month at most hospitals. If one has a nursing teaching certificate or has passed high level exams, it jumps to NT$35,000. That compares pretty well with most professions.
There's no difference in treatment. Male and female nurses get the same pay for the same work. But the women tend to feel that the midnight shift "saps their youth," whereas the men jump at the chance to earn a little more. (There's an extra NT$300 for the night shift and NT$500 for the late night shift.) Take Lin Hong-hsin, who regularly takes the late night shift. When you add the night bonuses to his salary, his earnings top NT$50,000 a month.
But even if male nurses are more suited to a lifestyle of night shifts and less concerned about losing their youthful appearances, they still have to consider relationships with their families. In this light, relying on night shifts to make money is not a good long-term plan.
And so practically all male nurses have a strategy for recharging their batteries. "When a candle burns out, that's the end of it, but flashlight batteries can be recharged," says Lin Hung-hsin, who uses time off to prepare for the high-level exam. Last year, he took a test for a class that would let him study for the advanced nursing exam while working at the same time. He wasn't accepted, but he's trying again this year. "In the future I hope I will be able to go abroad for further study, get a doctorate, and go into teaching," Lin says.
Another route:
Working for a few years as a nurse and then changing careers is another option, one that Chiou-liu Chin-pang took.
Based on working hours, salaries and opportunity for promotion, Chiou-liu studied for the university transfer student exam while working as a nurse. After being accepted at the night school of Taipei Medical College, he left his nursing job that he had held for a year and took up selling life insurance, a job with more flexible hours.His background in nursing has been of tremendous help. "What kind of illnesses are refused coverage or require additional payment? In what circumstances will the money be refunded? How is it refunded? I was clear about all of these questions," he says. "All I had to do was learn a bit about the insurance end of it."
With the same attitude toward nursing he had as a nurse, Chiou-liu quickly got into the thick of things. He made the switch successfully and is now a supervisor at Aetna Insurance. His doubled salary has enabled him to buy a house.
Working as a nurse for three years. Chou Yueting in August of this year changed positions to become an operator of high-tech cardiovascular machinery used during open-heart surgery. Was it because his salary was too low or because he had encountered setbacks? "It was neither," he says. "It was because I wanted to get married." Chou Yue-ting's fiancee is also a nurse, and nurses have irregular working hours. For the sake of their marriage they both wanted to make adjustments to how they worked. His fiancee has even thought about getting out of the medical field altogether.
Chou likes contact with people. The feedback from patients gratifies him. But "to take care of my family, I have had no choice but to change my original career path," he says with resignation.
Liu Ping-chi already feels worn out from the heavy load of work in the operating room, and his family is in the furniture business. "At any time I might go back into the business."
If you could do it all over:
In a time of equality between the sexes, no profession should sexually discriminate. Today, as the shortage of nurses grows, the nursing profession really needs men. But do the men who enter the profession have regrets about their choice?
"I agree that this profession needs men," says a heavy-hearted Sun Shih-chieh. "But if I could choose all over again, I wouldn't go this way." In hospitals, doctors are top bananas, and the nurses have yet to get any respect. The various injustices nurses suffer bother him.
"Eighty-five percent of the net profit in hospitals goes to the doctors, and the remaining 15 percent goes to the people who do most of the work, nurses included. This kind of distribution means that doctors are just taking other people's credit.
Nurses are no more respected in private clinics. Sun Shih-chieh's girlfriend works in a private clinic, where she makes less than NT$20,000 a month and is expected to mop the floor, wipe off tables and empty the garbage.
"I don't regret having taken this path. But I would think long and hard before choosing it again," says Lin Hung-hsin, sighing. It's tough be-ing a pioneer.
[Picture Caption]
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How will male nurses make out in a women's field?
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Involving what is more private, obstetrics has not as yet been able to accept male nurses. The fear is that they will only add to women's anxieties. (drawing by Tsai Chih-pen)
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Men get the same pay for the same work as their female colleagues, but because they are so few in number, they are often overlooked.
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How modern--a male nanny! Chiou-liu Chin-pang may have changed professions, but he remembers how to feed and wash a baby from obstetrics training.
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In units for the seriously ill, such as intensive care wards, there are more jobs that test one's strength. For these, men can shoulder a little more of the burden.
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Professional, knowledgeable, strong and bold, male nurses have what takes to make ideal ambulance rescue squad workers. (photo by Chan Chao-yang)
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Since men have joined its ranks, the nursing profession has gained a little vigor.