Television, Nurses and the Media

I have always admired dedication. The kind of dedication to a cause that is like a pit bull that lunges for your ankle, gets a mouthful of your jeans instead, but won’t let go because the prospect of achieving his original goal—sinking his teeth into your ankle—is too compelling.

With or without lipstick, Sandy Summers, RN, MSN, MPH, is just such a pit bull. In 2001, she and six graduate school classmates decided to address the nursing shortage by focusing on inaccurate portrayals of nurses on television. The formation of a nonprofit, The Center for Nursing Advocacy (The Center), soon followed.

In the ensuing eight years, as her former classmates left the project, Summers has relentlessly monitored TV programming and advertising, calling to task those in media who are responsible for misrepresentations of nurses, both flagrant and subtle. Recently The Center has decided to close and Summers’s former classmates have returned to help her new organization, The Truth About Nursing, continue the mission.

After eight years of what has amounted to research, in a collateral sense, Summers and her husband, Harry, have recently released SAVING LIVES: Why the Media’s Portrayal of Nurses Puts Us All at Risk. The book details how the media’s erroneous characterizations and negative stereotypes of fictional nurses have a dire effect on real nurses and their patients.

Essentially, a lack of respect for nursing, fueled by far-reaching television juggernauts, produces a domino effect that leads to paltry funding for nursing and a decreased interest in becoming a nurse, followed by an increased shortage of nurses and, ultimately, leading to unnecessary patient deaths due to an insufficient nursing force to care for them adequately.

In addition to citing myriad media infractions and the destructive effects they wreak on the nursing profession, Summers’s book empowers nurses to take action to get the respect they need to save lives.

The book is entertaining and irreverent; an enjoyable read about the seriously damaging and potentially deadly practice by the media of demeaning the nursing profession. It may open your eyes to the pervasive harm caused by what, on the surface, might be seen as innocuous amusement. You will most likely never watch TV the same way again