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Rita M. Gallagher, Ph.D., R.N.

Photograph of Rita Gallagher

...I really think that professional nursing allows one to put their knowledge to work on a case by case basis with a whole host of marvelous individuals.

Interview conducted by: Jeffrey Light on 9 July 1997 at 11:17 AM EDT
Q: Dr. Gallagher, what exactly is it that you do in your profession?
A: In my profession, I serve as a policy fellow with the American Nurses Association. My primary staff responsibility is to provide support to the American Nurses Association Congress on Nursing Economics and I deal with policy issues other than those dealing with the hospital and with children. So I deal with community and public health, long-term care, aging, academic education, a whole variety of activities.
Q: Can you tell us in a little more general terms what it is that nurses do and describe some of the different jobs that they have in taking care of the elderly?
A: Well, in general, I think when we talk about registered nurses, we think primary of someone working in a hospital with sick people, giving them their medications, shots, those sorts of things. But, in truth, registered nurses do more than working in the hospital. They care, of course, for all age groups, but with emphasis on persons who are aging, nurses work out in the community to help those people age in place. They may be home-care nurses coming into the person’s home to help them. They may be involved in adult day-care centers where the frail elderly would come during the day, those people who are not able to stay alone all the time, but conversely don’t need to be in a nursing home. Obviously registered nurses are very instrumental in the care provided in nursing homes. So that we see nurses not only take caring of sick people, but also trying to keep people on the well side.
Q: Can you describe the typical education that one would receive to become a nurse?
A: It’s the position of the American Nurses Association that preparation as a registered nurse should begin at the Baccalaureate level. However, there are a number of nurses currently practicing and still preparing at the Associate Degree level in community colleges and also in Diploma schools of nursing. We also see people coming into the profession who have degrees in other areas, coming in at either the Baccalaurate or Master’s level with a degree in a second profession.
Q: What are some of the range of salaries that are available to nurses?
A: Nurses salaries are all over the place in terms of dollars and cents. We may see a beginning nurse just out of school earning $25,000 a year on the off-shift providing care 7-1/2 or 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year. Or on the other hand, we may see people whose advanced education has allowed them to become faculty members where their salary may be twice that. So salaries are all over the place for registered nurses
Q: Now, most of the work that is available for nurses, is it in the public sector or the private sector?
A: I don’t know that I could say most of the work is available in either sector. There are opportunities for registered nurses in both the public and private sector. We are seeing more and more hospitals being taken over by large corporate entities, so many of those positions are in private sector, but there are still a tremendous number of positions open in the public sector.
Q: What are some of the technologies that are available for nurses in the workplace today?
A: Nurses work with the same or higher levels of technology than folks do in almost every other profession. Computerized charting is very, very heavily involved in many of the agencies and hospitals. They may use the computer for ordering of supplies, for charting on clients, for taking assessments, certainly the tools that nurses use on a daily basis are of a high technological nature. We see IV pumps being used now that are electric, where in the past it was simply a little roller that the nurse needed to set to her watch to see how many drips per minute the patient would get. So there are all levels of technology. We see people on life support systems that the nurses manage, heart-lung machines, we see people with pacemakers. We see all kinds of technology involved in nursing.
Q: One of the goals of the ThinkQuest contest is to encourage international cooperation. Are there a lot of opportunities available to nurses to work internationally?
A: There are opportunities for nurses to work internationally. The American Nurses Association is the U.S. member of what is called the International Council of Nurses which is all over the world. There are opportunities for interaction between and among member countries on an ongoing basis. Many of the schools of nurses in the United States have cooperative activities with schools in other countries. And so, the nurses, when they’re students get that opportunity and then are able, sometimes, to take advantage of that when they have passed their Boards and become registered nurses.
Q: Do you find that many of the nurses who work with older adults have some preconceptions before they start and later in their career they realize that some of these things aren’t true. Can you describe some of the myths of older adults?
A: Well, I think that we see two kinds of people going into long-term care or into care with aging clients. We see people who have studied long and hard and prepared to go into that arena and are very will aware of what kinds of clients they will be dealing with. On the other hand, in some instances, long-term care, because of its continual growth may be the only job opportunity available to some nurses and they may go into those positions with some myths in their minds about what they’re going to deal with. That, you know, they’re all going to be old, crotchety people who really just need to be taken care of as if they were children. And really, that’s not true.
Q: And one last question, do you have any words of encouragement for young people to enter into the nursing profession and do you feel it’s a rewarding experience?
A: I absolutely do feel that nursing is a rewarding experience. The opportunities are phenomenal, to work, first of all, with any sort of age cohort, that would be your pleasure, from tiny, tiny babies to the aging. There are opportunities in all venues from the hospital to home care to adult day care to nursing homes. I really think that professional nursing allows one to put their knowledge to work on a case by case basis with a whole host of marvelous individuals.

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