While we’re at it, can we put nuns back in long black dresses with wimples? How can I decide to rescue a flaming bus full of orphans and nuns if I can’t recognize them as nuns???
Lord help you, Little Nemo, I spent way too long trying to puzzle out what medical-care task the phrase “die on away teams” could possibly be a typo for before I got the Star Trek reference.
There will be retribution. [shakes fist]
Anyone remember candy stripers?
My first sister was one in the 60’s and I remember the vertically striped smock that she used to wear over her white uniform.
Apparently, it’s still a thing! Though I don’t recall seeing any of them at our local hospital (which I spent way too much time in when my Mom was hospitalized. http://www.royalgazette.com/article/20120105/ISLAND07/701059993
No, sorry, health codes won’t allow it. Far too many egregious injuries were occurring as nuns were trying to use the wimples to fly while playing lawn darts, resulting in the banning of the equipment for both.
This is a traditional English nurse uniform.
In the early 20th Century they wore something very close to a traditional nun’s uniform.
My mother bought her own uniforms - dresses, pants, shoes, etc. I don’t know if any of the hospitals she worked at gave her a clothing allowance, or if my parents took a tax deduction on them. She had two caps. She’d wash and starch one by hand while wearing the other one. I have no idea where she got the caps or what she’d do if she needed a new one.
Practical nurses wore white, but as I noted, no pin and no stripe on their caps. Female aides wore a sort of jumper-like outfit with a plain white blouse. As an ordinary aide I wore a regular white shirt, white pants and regular dress shoes, although I was allowed to wear shoes with those big foam rubbery soles as long as they had leather tops and were polished. No tunic, that was for male nurses like Mean Mr. Mustard. (I’m a guy, by the way. No need to apologize. I learned years ago that Dopers found my posting style to be somewhat “androgynous.”)
Volunteers wore pink and white jumpers, aka Candy Stripers. I think even the volunteers in the gift shop wore them.
Those methods of distinction won’t be adopted for another few centuries, mainly because the Federation of Planets won’t be invented for another couple centuries… :dubious:
Oh, was that the rationale they used? I figured too many people were copying me and playing Nun-skeet with the lawn darts (and actually getting good at it). :eek:
Then again 10% of those 10% probably got into the profession so they could wear those uniforms throughout their work day. Call 'em 1-percent-ers. 
–G!
I don’t need no needle to be givin’ me a thrill
And I don’t need no anesthesia or a nurse to bring a pill
I got a dirty down addiction that doesn’t leave a track
I got a jones for your affection like a monkey on my back
…–Jon Bon Jovi (Bon Jovi)
…Bad Medicine
…New Jersey
Scroll down midway here for a still from Call the Midwife. Blue & white nurses outfits with aprons.
StG
IIRC they were addressed as “sister” and in some countries continued to be so into contemporary times.
My friend Mike is a nursing student and his scrubs are green. (He had to buy them himself.)
My brother went into his first ceasarian (feeling pleased with himself for wearing the correct colours) and the registrar turned control over to him:) (They were all masked) Because obviously, the only person with such disregard for protocol as to habitually wear student colours was the senior surgeon, right?
I’ve always thought that more likely the registrar knew that my brother was a student, and was only pretending to mistake him for a senior surgeon, but my brother was always a sucker for believing what people told him.
White coats and nurses uniforms were discontinued to shift the cost of cleaning from the hospital to the staff. The insitutions pretended that this was for patient benefit, but the medical system always claims that every policy is for patient benefit. It’s just what they say.
The mother of a friend, working as a senior nurse in geriatrics, wore a nurse uniform as her personal work clothes after the hospital got rid of nurse uniforms. Because the patients (old people) were more comfortable having a nurse in nurse uniform.
Long sleeves are banned in the hospital I was in last week (vic.aus). They took notes by writing on their wrists. But my mother wore a fresh white coat every day. And it was boiled when it went to the laundry. And she took notes on her cuff, rather than writing on her wrist. She did /not/ approve of me writing on my skin: probably inks are safer now, but she didn’t think they were safe then.
(And when the doctors aren’t in scrubs, I can identify them by the way they dress. They dress differently than nurses and techs/assistants/porters. It’s a cultural thing.)
‘Sister’ still exists in the NHS - it’s a title given to certain senior nurse grades. I have ‘no’ idea how this works for male nurses.
One such example from an NHS hospital
In my hospital, everyone is required to wear ceil blue scrubs except for the doctors. Nurses, aides, phlebotomists, respiratory therapists, dietary, secretaries, security guards… everyone.
Administration told us the purpose is so patients and their families are tricked into believing there were a lot of nurses around.
A friend of mine is a nurse who has a sideline in making scrubs tops in funky fabrics and selling them to all comers on social media. No idea if the pants are standardised but the tops must not be here in my corner of Australia
Whenever one of the nurses on that show does a shift of London hospital work, she changes to a purple uniform that has a fuller skirt and big puffy sleeves–which I think looks adorable but impractical for any kind of nursing work.
I want the nurses around me to be able to concentrate on my care and not being distracted by the fit of their uniform or whatever. I don’t care if I get confused trying to identify a nurse, they all know who they are and they’ll find me if I need them. Outfits like Nurse Goodbody are only appropriate for Halloween.
As we’ve seen repeatedly in October & November discussions, lots of people apparently think that kind of nurse uniform is not even appropriate for Halloween. My main complaint is that I’ve never been invited to the kinds of events where those outfits are popular. 
–G!
I agree probably most patients feel better seeing someone in a crisp, white uniform. I believe some patients are intimidated enough by the uniform to not be candid with the doctor/nurse, and an aide is not trained to recognize everything the patient may be trying to tell them.
IMHO, the only things I reliably expect an aide to fully understand are, “I’m hot/cold/hungry/lying in my own waste; On a scale of 1-10 I feel X;” and “Please call the nurse.” Of course, they should inform the team of anything the patient asks about.
Charge nurse is the non-gendered term, but yes male charge nurses are sisters in some trusts. There are also senior male nurses called matrons, and male midwives.
Here’s a discussion on male sisters and matrons, and whether those terms should remain in use:
I agree. I recently spent a week in the hospital. I found the scrubs in various prints and colors cheerful and attractive.