CAREER FIELD RESEARCH

A field that I am very interested in entering is the medical field whether I become a nurse, pharmacist, or physician's assistant, I know that I want to help people. This interview did more than tell me what being a nurse is like, it made me realize why I want to go into the medical field. For my career field research I interviewed one of my neighbors, Judy Gauthier, who has been a nurse for 50 years at Johnson Memorial Hospital and their surgery center. She started working as a nurse in 1968 and retired in 2019, throughout the years she has worked as a staff RN, continuing care nurse and same day surgery nurse and has worked in the intensive care unit (ICU) and emergency room (ER). Interviewing  Mrs. Judy was a great experience for me, she told me all about her experiences, the highs and lows of nursing, and even about how nursing has evolved from the late 60s to 2010s. 
When she was going to school it was during the 60s so things were a little different then, but Mrs. Judy went to a 3 year nursing school where she was able to work in the hospital and get a lot of hands on experience. She said, “By the time we graduated we could pretty much do everything with our eyes closed”. Even though she had become so experienced by the time she was finished with her 3 years, the hospital was looking for workers with degrees, so she had to go to Boston College to finish her 4th year. A majority of the classes she had to take were biology, chemistry, anatomy and physiology, pharmacology and lots of math. The math was especially important because, back then, the hospitals couldn’t call up pharmacists and ask what the right dosage would be for a patient of a certain weight, so the nurses had to calculate it themselves, there was a lot they had to do themselves. 
Mrs. Judy explained that the work environment was wonderful but at times it could be very stressful because of the doctors and families, but the patients were great. Some of the worst and most frustrating parts of the job was the patients dying and being short staffed. Mrs. Judy said that the scheduling  people would make the schedules and say that there were enough people on shift but they would always need more help that they never got. Another frustrating thing was how the doctors were treated compared to the nurses Mrs. Judy said, “In the old days they were verbally abusive, doctors were supreme. They (the nurses) always had to give up seats for doctors (no matter what they were doing: charting or taking care of a patient's information etc.), because whatever they (the doctors) had to do was way more important”. Now she said that things have really changed a lot with all the workplace harassment laws and equity, but back then it was a real challenge. Although there were some bad parts to the job, the good always outweighed. For Mrs. Judy the best part about working as a nurse was the flexibility and being able to help a patient who was having a hard time and was nervous. She says, “It feels good at the end of the day when you have some satisfaction with what you did. Always a good day”. 
When she first started working the pay was not the best, the nurses were getting paid less than $100 a week but the shifts were great and they got pensions and didn’t have to put a penny into their retirement funds. The nursing field was primarily made up of women but around the time after Vietnam the many men started joining and the pay basically skyrocketed. Close to her retirement she was getting around $50 an hour and still had great benefits. 
When asked about work ethic involved she said that they had to be hard workers who were dedicated to their job. When she was working the work ethic was very good and all the departments got along well. Mrs. Judy said, “I could name everyone in X-ray and pharmacy. If someone called out sick we could pick up the ball. If we (the nurses) were out late on Saturday night, we would still show up, on time, on Sunday. Even working holidays was rewarding”. These nurses that she worked with really loved their job and gave their all to it.
While I’m still not sure exactly what I want to do in the medical field, this interview affirmed my feelings about wanting to join. The way Mrs. Judy talked about helping patients and finding the job so rewarding made me love it even more. Also the way she talked about everyday being different made me more interested. One thing she said that really stuck with me was, “No two days were alike, that's why I liked the job. For the 50 years I worked it was all different. Changing everyday”. This interview definitely made me realize the importance of a college education. Mrs. Judy explained that the medical field is always changing and new things are happening and being introduced. It is a field where you’re constantly learning new things and adapting, and I am excited to be a part of that.