Nursing and Substance Abuse

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Substance abuse among nurses is astonishing when considering that a nurse who is caring for a loved one may be under the influence of drugs or alcohol. A nurse is trusted with the life of the patient and to be intoxicated while working to care for that loved one in their time of need is very frightening. The differences among specialties of nursing are extraordinary from the perspective of a person who is inexperienced in the world of medicine. In certain specialties, a nurse is more prone to having a substance abuse problem due to their personality traits. In other specialties, the nurse might be taking a substance to escape the depression that accompanies their field of work. The importance of this study was to indicate which specialties were at greatest risk and how to spot a nurse who is using a substance. When a new generation of nurse enter the working field, it is possible to spot when a nurse is in danger of using a substance and assist in the prevention of this habit. In the nursing field, there are many specialties available to work at within the hospital setting. The article “Substance use among Nurses: Differences between Specialties” focused on 13 different specialties. The research method used by the author was a random sampling of six thousand nurses. An eight page anonymous survey was mailed to all the selected nurses and four thousand four hundred thirty eight responded to the survey. Each nurse was contacted six times to be reminded to fill out the survey and mail the results back. On the final attempt a post card was mailed, giving the nurse the opportunity to be removed for the research mailing list. This sensitive information was collected and subdivided into the nurse specialties. Less than three percent of the responses could not be assigned a specialty. Oncology nurses had the highest overall rate of substance use, which was largely due

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