NURSING is not a profession to which many men aspire, but the few who have braved public ridicule and cynicism to enter the field have found the experience rewarding, in more ways than one.

Twenty-six-year-old Roy Thompson is one the few, but like so many others in society, he used to think that nursing was a job for females.

“Like many persons, I did think that certain things (professions) were (for) males and some were for females. I didn’t want to be considered soft and I didn’t want to be labelled as a homosexual to be honest, so I had my doubts about it definitely,” he tells Career & Education.

Even so, he enrolled at the University of the West Indies School of Nursing in 2004 after being encouraged by his family and mentors. Following graduation in 2007, he was employed to University Hospital of the West Indies, where he is currently working in the Intensive Care Unit.

Now after two years in the profession, he is pleased with his decision, if for no other reason than that he enjoys job security.

“It has been interesting. It has its benefits in that you have a job, you have security and you are very marketable, anywhere you go in the world,” Thompson says.

And he is not alone.

Thompson’s work colleague Stephen Bailey obtained a degree in Management Studies before going to nursing school, but is happy with his decision. The marketability of the profession, Bailey says, is one of the reasons he opted to go to nursing school.

“Nursing is by far more marketable, because there is a shortage of health care professionals. Business degrees, you have no ends of them out there and some business degrees don’t equip you to work,” says Bailey, adding that their training in nursing takes them right out of school and into the hospital.

Unlike Thompson, he had no reservations about becoming a nurse.

“To me, work is work,” he says, noting that he had done the necessary research and spoken to his friends in other professions before settling on nursing.

“The persons who I spoke to in nursing were firm in nursing and believed in the cause and were very enthusiastic,” he adds.

While the marketability of the profession is a definite plus, Thompson and Bailey say they have definitely realised their worth since working in the hospital.

“The ladies are glad to have another male hand around to lift heavy patients, and I can tell you that sick people are heavy,” Bailey tells Career & Education jokingly.

He adds that some patients prefer working with male nurses, even as he acknowledged that others don’t.

“Some women would prefer a male to do things for them and the same with men. I had a patient once and this gentleman actually preferred that he got a male nurse, because as far as he believed, no woman but his wife was supposed to see him naked and that was his thing,” Bailey recalls.

Director of nursing administration at the University Hospital of the West Indies, Beverley Atkinson said people are generally more accepting of male doctors in comparison to male nurses.

“We have a lot of stereotypes about what males should do,” says the senior nurse who has been in the profession for more than 40 years. “Because our culture is changing, I think we should be able to accept men in a caring way.”

Fernando Green said he too has witnessed the stigma that plagues male nurses, particularly in rural Jamaica where he was raised. The St Ann native said he had originally signed up to pursue teacher education at the Mandeville-based Northern Caribbean University in 2003, but after a year of studying, switched to nursing.

“Prior to that, I did not know that males could be nurses. That was new to me,” he says.

Even after three years in the profession, he adds, people he meets still find the idea of him being a nurse unsettling.

“They are most times surprised. They would say: ‘So you are a nurse? Man can be nurse?” he points out.

Thompson says he has also got his fair share of teasing from friends and members of the general public.

“My friends always joke and call me “sister” or “matron” or “brother”,” says Thompson, who, despite the jeering, has no regrets about his chosen profession.

Indian national Bharat Singh entered the profession in order to be able to travel to the US and has so far found the profession more than tolerable.

“It’s a good experience and it is a friendly working environment. I get a good knowledge of nursing here,” said Singh, who is from a country where male nurses are commonplace.

Even so, the nurse, who has been working in Jamaica for the past two years, said his heart is still set on working in the US.

And he is not the only one.

Thompson, Bailey and Green all have plans to work abroad at some point.

“Nurses want to stay in Jamaica. This is where you born and grow, this is where you live and this is where your family is and everything. So they want to be here. But just to make sense out of life, they are being pushed overseas,” says Bailey.

He believes that nurses are so poorly compensated in Jamaica that many are forced to seek employment in other countries.

“I am not eager to tell people that I am a nurse but it is not because of a stigma with nursing, it is because of the way that nurses are treated in Jamaica,” Bailey says.

He adds that the low compensation package is an even bigger issue for men because for the most part, they are still expected to be the breadwinners in their homes. This, Bailey says, is not possible on the salary that nurses on the island earn.

Despite this, the men believe that the profession provides them with many avenues for growth, because of the various fields attached to it. Bailey, for example, wants to venture into primary health care while Green is currently pursuing his master’s in occupational and environmental safety and health to increase his marketability. Singh, who currently holds a diploma in nursing from India, is to begin his nursing degree in Jamaica this September. Thompson is set on a PhD.

“I definitely want to move from the bedside by the time I am 30. I want to go into being a nurse anesthetist and hopefully do a PhD where I get to teach persons, because I do a lot of that when I am at work,” he tells Career & Education.

Meanwhile, Thompson’s advice to other men interested in the nursing profession is clear.

“We definitely need more men in the profession. You would have job security and you would definitely become more marketable. Don’t be swayed by people’s opinion, that’s their issue and that’s their insecurity,” he says.