Twitter And What I Found There

Oh, Twitter. Twitter is my #1 procrastination go-to. I wish there was a way to see how much time I've actually spent on just browsing (stalking) on Twitter, but it's probably best kept secret. When I read that this post was about searching Twitter for content relating to our major, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to find much behind all the Kanye, "what are those"-eque posts that seem to make up 90% of tweets. I also had the idea that because my field was nursing, there wouldn't be much to discuss(for some reason). I found that most of the tweeting nursing accounts do is about their programs, trying to lure people in basically, but there was a bit of debate over current events.

Healthyfeetnurses.com. "شعار_التمريض_الجامعي"  v4/2/15 via WikiMedia Commons. Law No. 3 of 1971 on Copyright. 

• The first legitimate account I found that discussed issues in nursing was @NursingTimes, an account that's comprised of tweets about news affecting nurses. The account usually ends most tweets asking for thoughts on the issues, using the hashtag #NTtwitchat. This is where I found the most interesting discussions between people in the nursing field. A recent discussion that has people talking is the possibility of implementing a new "support role" for nurses, or a nursing associate. There's a lot of debate surrounding this because nursing is already a kind of "support role" in itself, so what exactly would nursing associates be doing? How would it affect the salaries of current nurses? There is no definitive news yet on what's going to be decided, so there is room for a lot of speculation on this topic. I find this interesting and relevant because the possibility of there being a support role for me could really change the dynamic of my future career.

• Other than the debate on nursing associates I mentioned above, another big issue that seems to get people angry are nursing cuts or layoffs. There's random feeds everywhere of people complaining about this issue, explaining that all this really does is bring harm to the patients who need constant care. An example that came up quite a bit has to do with nursing cuts overseas done by the NHS, or National Health Service. One specific tweet by @Archangelollil links us to an article on NHS laying off nurses in the UK. He calls the cuts a joke and the comments on the article express the same kind of anger and confusion. I personally agree with how they feel. It's impossible for the busy doctors to do all the tasks a nurse does themselves, so laying off nurses hurts the patient more than anyone else. 

• I wasn't surprised to see people talking about the cuts or the questions of salary, because those topics make sense to argue. People talk about those kinds of things in real life, so why not on Twitter? Though I was a little surprised to see how passionate some people got. Some *questionable language was used in some tweets, but it does still make sense. The issues that come up have to do with people's health care, something that shouldn't be taken lightly. I had no idea that the role of nursing associate was in the works, so I did learn something new there. Otherwise, most of the other conversations were what I expected. 

Now that I've navigated the nursing side of Twitter, I can spend even more time procrastinating catching up on those issues too!