On the 250th anniversary of US Independence Day, two Penn Nursing leaders call on nurses to embrace their historic roles as advocates for social justice and community health July 4, 2026 –…
Category: MEDIA
The sophomore blues
2025-26 TV Overview! Last year’s wave of physician-centric new Hollywood shows returns Sophomore TV dramas Doc (Fox), Watson (CBS), and Brilliant Minds (NBC) all look set to continue telling audiences that nurses are low-skilled physician helpers. Even the…
Nonstop
BBC radio show highlights new Swiss film about a tough nursing shift In July 2025 the BBC radio show The Arts Hour featured writer-director Petra Volpe, who discussed her film The Late Shift. The movie…
The Professional
New film highlights one nurse’s struggle with understaffing Petra Volpe’s powerful 2025 drama The Late Shift follows a hospital nurse juggling the physical and psychological needs of 13 patients on one intense shift. Viewers…
Unprofessional
Administration plans to cut federal loans for nursing education In November 2025, the Trump Administration proposed to limit loans for graduate students in nursing and other predominantly female fields by excluding them…
Barriers
The New York Times on the life of nurse Eddie Bernice Johnson In January 2024, the New York Times had a helpful obituary for Johnson, who had died at 89. Johnson was the first nurse…
Nurses Issue Call for Global Resistance to Trump Administration’s Attack on Public Health
As nurses and their supporters, we urge the public to make immediate and sustained efforts to resist the Trump Administration’s agenda to destroy global health. We have devoted our professional lives to…
Burn the witch
Questions raised about the conviction of nurse Lucy Letby Recently New Yorker journalist Rachel Aviv examined whether British NICU nurse Lucy Letby should have been convicted of killing infants in her care….
Malicious
The Philippines-based news website Rappler reported that nurses at one local hospital were being required to wear adult diapers so they could care for Covid-19 patients for 12 hours straight, without breaks
Brilliant
New health-related shows are here, and some have nurse characters. The central character on the NBC mockumentary St. Denis Medical seems to be a senior nurse. And ABC’s Doctor Odyssey, set on a cruise ship, actually has two nurse characters. But other new shows seem to fit the physician-centric model of ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy, especially Fox’s Doc and NBC’s Brilliant Minds. In any case, good portrayals of nursing will return, on the long-running Call the Midwife (BBC/PBS) and Virgin River (Netflix).
Nurse of America
Remembering nursing pioneer Claire Fagin. In January 2024, U.S. nursing leader Claire Fagin died at the age of 97. Obituaries appeared in many major publications. One of the best was in the Washington Post. That one focused on Fagin’s year leading the University of Pennsylvania, but also on her key role in pushing nursing forward, through her forceful advocacy and emphasis on a stronger academic curriculum. At the Truth About Nursing, we especially appreciated her mentoring and support over the last two decades.
A job with your best friends
Fall 2023 TV Overview! Despite the Hollywood strikes, good portrayals of nursing are coming on the BBC’s Call the Midwife and on Netflix’s Virgin River. But when more shows appear, the prime-time landscape will likely…
The Misinformers
In March 2023 VICE News reported that Nevada nurse Nicole Sirotek and her group American Frontline Nurses had been spreading disinformation about Covid-19 and vaccines, while harassing those who challenged them. A particular focus was the group’s targeting of nurse practitioner Tyler Kuhk, with tactics that included meritless complaints to his employer, his nursing board, and the police.
New Zealand government partners with soap opera to promote nursing
In August 2022, The Spinoff reported that the New Zealand government planned to team up with the soap opera Shortland Street to address the nation’s nursing shortage. This move was easy to mock, but in fact even the silliest fictional media has the potential to affect how the public sees nursing—for better or worse.
Submit nominations for the 2022 Truth About Nursing media awards!
These annual awards spotlight the best and worst of media for nursing We are now accepting nominations for the Truth About Nursing awards, which recognize the most notable – best and worst…
“Does nurse BokHee ever speak?”
More good portrayals of nursing are coming on the BBC’s Call the Midwife and Netflix’s Virgin River. But Bob Hearts Abishola (CBS) returns with a nurse who remains determined to become a physician because she believes it has a higher status. And the prime-time landscape is still dominated by physician-centric programming, including Grey’s Anatomy, The Good Doctor, and New Amsterdam.
Doc McStuffins
Each episode of Doc McStuffins sends a basic health message, usually in a narrow, physician-centric “diagnosis and treatment” framework. But wait! One of the dolls, Hallie the Hippo, is “Doc’s nurse.” At different points the Hallie character reflects most of the major nursing stereotypes, from low-skilled handmaiden to motherly angel to crusty battle-axe. Her main job often seems to be fetching the Big Book of Boo-Boos for Doc. . The show’s creator has noted that she originally saw the Hallie character as a “fumbling, bumbling mess,”
They don’t even get a pen!
In a March 2022 episode, Mrs. Maisel offered a short tribute to the unsung nurses caring for a family member. She praised the nurses for spending time with patients and comforting families, as well as doing work like changing bedpans. But she portrayed nurses as unskilled female angels, not as serious health professionals like the male physicians who, though self-important and uncaring, at least got to use pens.
Push
Chicago Tribune highlights pioneering work of local nurses
In November 2019 the paper had two good pieces about nurses improving health in innovative ways. First, it ran a substantial obituary of Vivian Meehan, a ground-breaking national leader in addressing anorexia nervosa and related conditions. And a later article profiled sexual assault forensic nurses, discussing their vital work at the intersection of health care and law.
Living up to this superhero image is impossible
Washington Post aims to debunk myths about U.S. nursing
A fairly good February 2022 feature, “Five myths about nursing,” addresses some misconceptions about the profession. The piece focuses on ideas that have only arisen during the Covid era, such as that nursing is “lucrative” and that nurses are “superheroes.” But it also discusses some enduring threats to nursing practice.