Operating Room Nurse Day

While the surgeon may be the star of the operating theatre, without the work of a team of skilled and reliable operating room nurses vital surgical procedures could not take place. These hard-working professionals are responsible for all aspects of patient care during a medical operation, including welcoming, assessing and prepping patients, handling medical equipment, helping with procedures and maintaining a sterile environment.

It is one of the most demanding nursing jobs, as more complicated operations are known to go on for many hours on end and nurses need to maintain focus and work constantly for long periods without a break. That’s why it can be easily agreed that these lifesavers definitely deserve their own day—just one day of every year, when people can stop and think about just how much they owe the operating room nurses who helped make their operations successful.

History of Operating Room Nurse Day

The history of nursing dates back well over 2000 years. The Hippocratic Collection describes skilled care and observation of patients by “attendants” on several different occasions, which were most likely the first real nurses mankind has ever known. During later historical periods, both nuns and monks tended to provide nurse-like care to the sick.

Examples of this can be found in the histories of many religions, such as Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam. Archaeologists have also discovered plenty of evidence suggesting humans have been performing various types of surgery for up to 9,000 years, with the earliest Egyptian surgical texts dating back to about 1,500 BC.

In 1989, the State Governor of Iowa, Terry Bransted, decided to help reward operating room nurses for all of their (often underappreciated) work and put through an executive order to establish an annual Operating Room Nurse Day.

How to Celebrate Operating Room Nurse Day

In short, those who have had surgery or whose family members of friends have had surgery are encouraged to thank the operation room nurses in person or with a card or gift to show appreciation of the extremely important work that they did then and that they do every day. Nurses are the unsung heroes of medicine, with the doctors and surgeons usually taking all of the credit for a successful procedure.

So take the time this Operating Room Nurse Day to let the surgical nurses who has helped you or a close one enjoy life to the fullest again by performing his or her responsibilities to the fullest of his or her capacity. This does not require a grand gesture or expensive presents—as with most important things in life, it’s the thought that really counts.

And nobody has ever turned down a good box of chocolates or a nice bottle of wine, have they? The kind gesture, as well as the fact that the nurse or nurses might well be quite surprised by it will definitely make their day and help them get through whatever difficult or unpleasant work that may await them just a bit easier.

Doctors and surgeons are not the only people who deserve recognition, appreciation and admiration for their work, after all. Nurses face life-or-death situations on an everyday basis, too, so let’s make sure they know just how grateful we are to have them working to make our lives better, and in many cases, save them altogether.