Goodbye, Snoopy: New dress code infuriates nurses at The Ottawa HospitalScrubs with cartoon characters, other drawings bannedA new dress code for The Ottawa Hospital is infuriating nurses, who will be forbidden to wear scrubs and uniforms with cartoon characters or other drawings on them.



"It's a terrible policy," says a nurse, who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity out of concern for his job. "The . morale is very low now because of it."



The policy was developed and implemented by the hospital's human resources and executive teams. Both the nurses and hospital executives say the dress uggs on sale code coincides with the hospital's new "service excellence" plan."They're trying to make us a top workplace, and in doing so they've pissed off every nurse in the hospital," says the nurse. "I can't really see how shoving a policy down the throat of your primary caregivers is going to make you a best employer."



The new dress code is aimed at making nurses easier for patients to spot, says Ginette Rodger, the hospital's chief nursing executive and senior vicepresident for professional practice.



"These changes have been made based on the hospital's image, and the patient's need to identify ugg boots clearance who is working for them," says Rodger, "Very often, (patients) see a lot of people and they don't know who they are and what they do."



For the nurse, professional image and quality of care go handinhand. "If you are happy with your appearance, you are going to provide better care because your morale is going to be higher," he says.



"If you have people unhappy with a policy, their morale will be lower and they'll provide less care than if they were happier. It's selfevident."



For those unhappy with the changes, the biggest complaint surrounds wearing lab coats. The new lab coats must clearly state a health practitioner's title, and have to be worn at all times when they're outside their usual units. They don't have to be worn when working with patients as they can pose an infection hazard.



"What the patients say is that they want their professionals to be well identified and that they look professional," says Rodger.



"But a lot of patients suffer from 'white coat syndrome'," warns the nurse, meaning they get anxious when they're surrounded by people in medical uniforms. "They don't like it. A friendly uniform being replaced by a staunch lab coat is not necessary."



The nurse says his union Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 4000, which represents registered practical nurses and a raft of support staff at the Ottawa Hospital's several campuses can't do anything until the policy is enacted and a member is disciplined for violating it.



The union representing the hospital's registered nurses objects as well. "We want to dress in colours and prints because it's cheerful for our patients," says Frances Smith, an intensivecare unit nurse and a representative from the Ontario Nurses Association Local 83. "As a registered nurse, I believe that all of our members and employees do everything they can to be professional to provide safe, quality and professional care. That's our priority . what's important is that we identify ourselves to our patients every day.



"It's about professionalism and I fully applaud that," says Smith. "But a lot of people are having a hard time getting their heads around why it matters if we're not wearing them around our patients.