The movie NURSES If Florence Could See Us Now made me feel very inspired. Listening to all the nurses share their experiences and why they love nursing was a reminder for why I’m going into this field. I feel like this year especially it’s been very scary in regards to nurses feeling unsupported. I know during my preceptorship, it was evident that those nurses were experiencing extreme burnout and did not feel supported or appreciated by management. Many were picking up extra shifts to compensate for the higher level of acuity care on the floor due to COVID patients. However, it was also clear on that floor how much teamwork existed among the nurses and other members of the health care team. They truly relied on each other because they understood each other’s long days. In the movie, there was examples of teamwork throughout: for example, during the part where nurses were able to present a bill on needle safety and get it passed in DC, it showed how much nurses rely on teamwork and working together to be successful.

I feel like during interviews I will stand out by expressing how one of my strengths is collaborating with others and how much I love being a team player. That’s another reason why I love nursing; it offers such a diverse role in caring for patients through a network of health care workers. I love how we all bring something to the table and have a shared goal of returning a patient to their healthiest. I feel like the UNE nursing program prepared me well for working as a team member in a clinical setting by all the group projects we do, and mixing up clinical groups often. It allowed for us to meet new people and learn how to work with those people in the classroom, simulation, over zoom, and in an actual clinical setting. One challenge I face often is how I stumble over my words when explaining certain things. I fear that it will get in the way of future teaching skills to patient, and make it hard for me to get important information across. However, I was very aware of this and decided to come out of my comfort zone and take public speaking as an elective in order to try to become a better speaker. I continue to work on this, but I know I have gotten better and ultimately it helped my confidence.