I’m not sure who wrote this or what this website even is, but thought it was worth repeating, just to make some nurses queasy:

During the early days of nursing, there was no uniform for nursing. They only gained popularity when Florence Nightingale, one of the first women pioneers in the medical field, established the importance of wearing nursing uniforms during the Crimean war. The first nursing uniforms were dark-gray, full-length dresses covered by white aprons. Today, nurse uniforms take on many styles and functions for seeing to the safety and security of patients.

Over the years, nursing uniforms evolved. White dresses and hose were the standard garb, but when many complained because these were impractical and difficult to work in, white tunics and pants came about. These were more comfortable to wear and nurses could actually move around easily. Nowadays, most nurses wear colored uniforms and nurse scrubs. The colored uniforms and scrubs are more convenient, since dirt or stains can’t easily be detected.

However, according to many critics, more patients are confused with colored uniforms and nurses can’t be easily picked out from the rest of the hospital staff. That is why, many hospitals reinstated white nursing uniforms with a designer flair for style and comfort. These uniforms not only give patients a sense of security, but also give nurses a level of comfort and style that they expect in their day-to-day attire.

Nursing uniforms are indeed an effective way for patients to easily recognize the nurses who take care of them. Not only that, nursing uniforms give a sense of pride to the nurses who wear them, since they are just one symbol of their love and dedication to their profession.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but this sweet little tribute to the “woman in white” is not only riddled with errors, it is downright silly.

The earliest uniforms were those wore by nurses who were part of religious orders, and that included both men and women. So if we want to get technical, those can be considered the first nursing outfits, and later on, secular nurses in some nations did wear uniforms based on that, ie, the veils worn by nurses in the UK and Australia (along with the term “sister” utilized).

Florence Nightingale had absolutely nothing to do with wearing uniforms, and she established no such protocol during her stint in the Crimea. At the time Nightingale took her troopers to care for the soldiers in the Crimea, she wanted to draw a strict line between nurses and hookers (yes, you read right). Her women were coming to nurse men, not to screw them, and she established strict protocols of behavior so that they would be taken seriously. At this time in England, secular nurses had a very bad reputation, and there was good reason for it.

Her nurses did not wear uniforms, and the idea never crossed Nightingale’s mind. The women wore ordinary dresses that one might wear for doing housework, and covered them with an apron, to keep them clean. And even in the first nursing programs–including the one Nightingale started in 1860–the students did not wear uniforms. In fact, the idea of wearing a uniform was repugnant, since it was something that they equated with being a maid.

The first real nursing uniform appeared in the 1880s, at Bellevue in NY. Up until this point, nursing schools and nurses did not wear uniforms. Euphemia Van Rensselaer is given credit for the introduction of the blue and white striped uniform, with the white cap and white apron, that was adopted by the school. However, the style of the dress was left to the discretion of the individual student. . By 1900 the style of the uniform was standardized, along with a distinctive cap.

The white uniform, certainly the most impractical color that could have possibly been chosen, was not always an “integral” part of nursing, regardless of those who moan and groan that it is nothing short of a threat to national security if nurses wear anything else. Up until the 1920s, the standard nursing uniform was generally a single color or striped dress, worn with a white cap and white apron. No white uniforms. And since most graduate nurses worked either as private duty nurses or for the public health system, it really didn’t matter that much what they wore. Hospitals were staffed for the most part by slave…oops..I mean student labor.

That is why, many hospitals reinstated white nursing uniforms with a designer flair for style and comfort. These uniforms not only give patients a sense of security, but also give nurses a level of comfort and style that they expect in their day-to-day attire.

It would be interesting to hear how wearing a white uniform gives a nurse a “level of comfort and style…” Blood stains really show up nicely on white, and it gets gray or yellow tinged after many rounds in the washing machine. Is wearing white really more “comfortable” than other colors? Most people also do not look particularly good in white, and I doubt there’s a great sense of comfort in knowing that every speck of dust, spill, and splatter is going to show up on your uniform. I personally find the white uniform distasteful in that it reeks of the “angel” image of nurse, one of purity and selflessness. The angel of mercy, the angel in white. Somehow, you are less angelic in scrubs.

Hospitals that are forcing nurses to wear white again have faced resistance, and the only reason that they are doing so is that they see it as some sort of PR scam. You know, that they are going to draw a larger share of patients who will flock to the hospital because their nurses are professional and wear white. Or some misguided ninny in PR thinks that forcing nurses to wear white is going to do wonders for recruitment and retention. Believe me, the return to whites is not because the nursing staff requested it.

Finally, the idea that nurses should wear white so patients can recognize them is a little outdated. Would we return to horse and buggy, simply because a lot of people used to recognize that as the means for traveling long distances? The color white is merely a blimp in the evolution of nursing dress. That’s all it is. Nurses in the US wore white for about 50 years before the dress code began to evolve. Caps mercifully vanished, and scrubs became more common. Many older patients, or those who grew up on General Hospital, still associated white with nurses, but I doubt that is true for the majority of patients. The people who diligently tune into House, ER, and Scrubs do not see nurses in pearly whites. They do not see nurses with caps on their heads. The association with white is disappearing.

Some people also think that anyone wearing a suit or a nice dress is also a doctor. Should we tell executives, QA people, social workers, pharm reps, etc., that they too, must wear a uniform so as not to confuse the patient?

Anyway, this article was just one of those silly diatribes, riddled with inaccurate information, that is trying to glorify the good old days of white–those days, I may add, when nurses were paid less than factory workers, had to stand when a male doctor walked into the room, and mopped floors as part of her duties. Thanks but no thanks.