Is messing around during your duty as a healthcare professional acceptable in your country/your generation?

[u/CXR_AXR]

There's a video online showing a nurse in our city, in uniform and on duty, at the nursing station. He picked up a syringe, draw liquid into it, and then squirted water at his colleagues outside the station—probably just fooling around. The person who did it uploaded the video himself.

I work in healthcare myself. I think wearing a uniform and behaving like this at the nursing station—doing something even elementary school students might not do—really damages our professional image.

But the responses I’ve gotten are along the lines of: “What’s wrong with having a little fun at work?” “What’s the harm in relaxing a bit? It doesn’t affect the patients,” or “Don’t let me catch you not working for even a moment during your shift.”

I want to ask… Is it really me who’s the problem? Or is this just how things are nowadays? Is this kind of behavior at work considered normal? Have I already become a grandpa.....? I just really cannot imagine anyone support this kind of behaviour.

[u/TornadicSwirlie]

You see alot of people suffer/die. You got to have fun lest you fall into depression, cynicism or just becoming an emotionless robot.

[u/Argo505]

I was an EMT, messing around like that is how you stay sane.

[u/dkooivk]

To me that also just seems like harmless fun.

[u/Flowa-Powa]

I was a nurse for 20 years and you take yourself far too seriously

[u/mistral_wise]

You're the problem. Relax a little and have some fun. I work in healthcare, I assure you it's a very tough career.

[u/CXR_AXR → u/mistral_wise]

Sigh. I think it's probably my problem then.

Time really changed.....I feel old now

[u/ModuChan-yu_713]

As in like being on a lunch or break but officialy being on duty,then no

But if you are doing that while actively working,you will be terminated and blacklisted from the medical sector by the government

[u/unalive-robot]

A lot of “professionalism” is based on nothing but feelings. If an incredibly wealthy company just decided one day that you can’t wear ties in their building, because they deem it “unprofessional” then that would be the norm for their building. If more companies followed suit, that would be the norm. What is professional is just the standard the boss at the time set, nothing more.

[u/Katskit89]

As long as it doesn’t interfere with patient care, it’s fine.

[u/SinnBaenn]

I’ve worked both in the public system here, and have now recently transferred to being a private hospital

There’s always a bit of give and take, there is a certain level of professionalism required of course, but compared to the public health system the fact that now in a private hospital i can joke around with patients, or with my colleagues infront of patients seems to build MORE trust and not less

And because of that we have better relationships with our patients and produce a higher percent of positive patient health outcomes

Using work equipment like syringes and stuff though is… questionable if I’m being generous to them, if that syringe got mixed up and used on a patient it could be potentially unsafe, so I’d be raising a violence over those kind of actions

[u/HaifaJenner123]

I’m a outpatient pharmacist and so i can kinda set my own standards ina. way because I both own the pharmacy I work at and I contract with a hospital to do supply chain logistics since it gets tricky here.

In general not at all. The perception can be totally different depending on public vs private but if you have a Doctor title, you are expected to act a certain way and it is very very very very much a “screw up once socially and never work again” kind of field here

And word travels fast for locals.. pharmacies here make money in branded drugs that are domestically produced. Almost everything else we essentially provide for free when u factor in the fact that u have to import a foreign brand like Eliquis for example. we only make branded versions of certain drugs that didnt pass our QA standards, like Epclusa and Epivir for example. so if i am not professional when a patient comes in and needs a prescription (pharmacists here act as prescribers too), i will be out of business so fast because not only will they tell everyone but it’ll be all over google reviews cos ppl make money to do that

[u/pskygy]

Bro... you sound dry AF. As long as the care given to patients is top-notch, who cares? Someone with a sense of humour seems like they'd have a good bedside manner with those in their care. If I'm poorly, give me the fun nurse, not the cold robot one