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Pens that don’t work? Socks that cut off your circulation? Cheap key chains? Yep, those sound like some Nurses Week gift failures to me!
I have some suggestions for gifts I think every nurse would appreciate for Nurses Week. Here are two major ones (you can thank me later!):
A real lunch break
- You know, the kind of lunch break that involves leaving the nursing unit, or even leaving the premises all together. The kind where you actually taste your meal instead of inhaling it on the go. Maybe even a full hour-long lunch so we could enjoy the food we eat and take our time getting back on shift.
IOU: A time out
- A certificate that allows you the ability to just call a time out. I’m talking stopping everything, putting your hands in the air and taking a “Calgon moment.” No explanation necessary, just produce the IOU. We should be able to use this IOU whenever the need arises. You could even put an expiration date on it, although I doubt it would take long to use this one up.
Here are a few more random ideas for gifts:
- A valet ticket for parking
- A free lunch (or more than one)
- IOU: One time you get to leave work early
- IOU: One time you get to come to work late
- IOU: One request for a new pot of coffee be made (when the pot is empty)
- IOU: One admission paperwork completion
- IOU: A free breakfast
Don’t get me wrong, I’m always appreciative of the recognition, but I think if we’re going to celebrate all things nursing, then the gifts should be worth the year-long wait!!
Any other suggestions? What would be a great gift for you this Nurses Week?
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RN
Registered Nurse
Anything would be better than not even being acknowledged! I work for 2 different agencies & neither one of them so much as sent a card or email.
RN
Registered Nurse
This is a great post. I always feel terrible when people aren’t recognized.
I remember working for a National Corporation, multi-billion dollar corp. in healthcare…and for nurse’s week, they had a giant box in the breakroom…filled to the brim with plastic junk in clear plastic bags (from Taiwan) and were to go to the box and select our gift. We could choose a plastic phone (none of them worked), a plastic calculator (50% worked) or plastic headphones.
A giant box of junk…that’s all we meant to them. In the meantime, our CEO that year earned 17 million in salary with an additional 17 million in bonus. As far as I know, that box of junk is still in the breakwork…or perhaps it’s clogging up a landfill somewhere by now. It was a mockery. The next year we got pizza for lunch…but only if you happened to be working that day. If it was your day off, you were off ill or on vacation…you got a big, fat nothing. I hated that company!!! They are still around….
Here’s a great idea! You can give it any time of year to your nurse/friend – a book series written for nurses entitled “The Traveler: In the Beginning.” It’s the first in a series that will follow a traveling nurse (Bethany) to different locations where strange/scary things are occurring. This is the first book, the second will be out near the end of the year (2012)
Also in a few months will be a book on sepsis written for nurses entitled “Winning the Fight Against Sepsis – What Every Nurse Should Know.”
We nurses love to read, and having a book written by a nurse, for nurses should be quite entertainging!
Both books are available on Amazon, Dogear, Borders, and Kindle.