Why Student Nurses Must Advocate For Themselves

Confrontation can be difficult, but as a Student Nurse it’s vital that you speak up and stand up for yourself. Student Nurse, Alexandria, explains why in this short video.

Hi guys, it's Alexandria Grace with some more Student Nurse advice.

My tip for today is the importance of advocating for yourself as a Student Nurse.

I think sometimes if you have quite an introverted personality or you don't like confrontation or you don't really know who to address things with if you have an issue or if you've witnessed an issue, it can be quite difficult to do this but it's so important to advocate for yourself.

Advocate for other people, like other students, other Nurses, the patients, the families. If you're having trouble, if you feel like you're being mistreated by patients, parents, staff.

If you feel like you're not getting anything out of your learning experience, or if you feel like you're not achieving the way you think you could achieve and you feel like you're not being represented or anything like that, it's really important to speak up about it.

Because otherwise, that's going to affect your learning experience.

And it can also be quite damaging to your mental health if you maybe feel like you might be experiencing conflict on placement.

It can just make the whole experience a lot more difficult and a lot more challenging.

And it's just really important that you get the best out of your placement experience.

So advocate for yourself, if you need something to change or you want to see a change, make sure you help yourself.

It's so important to make sure that your experience is as good as possible.

If you see anything wrong or anything that's concerning you with other people, you should also address that as well.

But at the same time, it's not just about protecting other people, is also about protecting yourself.

So speak up if you have an issue.