Nurses increasingly experience retaliation for speaking up or saying NO. Preventable medical error is now the third leading cause of death. One major reason for this horrifying statistic published by John Hopkins University is because nurses who see and know the most are afraid to speak up. When nurses do report unsafe practice or conditions they are often retaliated against. A not so uncommon form of retaliation is to report nurses to the Board of Nursing with false or trumped up allegations. Sadly nurses daily find themselves in overwhelming situations where bad patient outcomes and failures to rescue are predictable. Nurses are asked to take on patient assignments that cannot be safely managed with one nurse and all too often something goes wrong. With the advent of metrics, reducing the length of patient stays, nurses are forced to hurry and take short cuts in order to meet the bottom line being profit. When a nurse is reported to the Board of Nursing their and families lives are devastated. Well some control is available if the nurse has an advocate they can afford who will help them navigate the process and be heard.
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