Male Nurses' Attitude as a Nursing Professional and Attitude of Female Colleagues Towards Male Nurses, at AIIMS, New Delhi

Abstract

The study aimed to assess the male nurses’ attitude as a nursing professional, and attitude of female colleagues towards male nurses. A cross sectional survey of Nurses (including both male and female nurses) was done in a 1500-bedded teaching hospital in North India. Male and female nurses who have at least 2 years of working experience in nursing were recruited. The total participants were 69 male nurses selected by simple random sampling and 132 female nurses selected by convenience sampling. A self-developed 5-point Likert scale was used to assess attitude of male nurses towards nursing profession, which had 16 items and 12 items for the female nurses’ attitude towards male nurses. The attitude towards nursing was overwhelmingly positive with 70 percent (male nurses) and 67.4 percent (female nurses working with male colleague) of them having “positive” attitude, 25 percent (male nurses) and 22.7 percent (female nurses working with male colleague) having “very positive” attitude. None of them had a negative attitude towards the profession. Chi square test showed no significant association. To conclude, male nurses are comfortable in the profession and have a healthy attitude towards their profession. Majority of the female nurse colleagues were comfortable working with the male nurses and most of them believed that men in nursing have brought a positive change in the profession.