Lisa Kullack felt enraged scrolling through her Facebook feed this Halloween season.
Kullack, a New York-area-based registered nurse, saw a photo of a male surgeon dressed in scrubs with a large, fake breast exposed under his top. The badge around his neck read "Wendy RN," for "registered nurse."
The costume was one crude version of many "sexy nurse" costumes that routinely pop up around Halloween, which are among bestsellers in 2019 — as they seem to be every year. Publications like Romper and Entertainment Tonight tout the costume as one of the most popular of all time. The rapper Cardi B appeared as a sexy nurse just last week during a performance.
Despite the ubiquity of the "sexy nurse" costume, some practicing nurses feel the over-sexualized depictions perpetuate stereotypes of nursing being an unskilled woman's profession. They also say it may contribute to workplace harassment.
"A sexy nurse costume, particularly when worn by a physician, feels like a big 'FU'," Kullack said in an email to Business Insider. "This speaks volumes about the unequal power structure of healthcare."
RNs say "sexy nurse" costumes demean the profession
Major retailers are cashing in on the trope.
While Yandy, the lingerie brand that sells scandalous costumes come Halloween, would not tell Business Insider how many sexy nurse costumes it sells per year, the "On Call Nurse Costume" is currently one of the top five most popular costumes on the website, as of this writing. The "Women Lingerie Nurse School Girl Outfit" and "Sexy Triage Nurse" costumes are in the top 15 best-sellers on Amazon under women's exotic costumes.
Retailers might make a profit off sexy nurse imagery, but RNs themselves say this is just one example of how nurses aren't depicted as scientific medical professionals the way doctors are. Nurses, who make up the bulk of healthcare workers nationwide, typically get secondary, one-dimensional roles in many hospital TV shows, Variety's Kathryn VanArendonk found.
"Sexy nurse" outfits perpetuate stereotypes that the profession is low-skilled, assistant work for women, said MarySue Heilemann, an associate professor at the UCLA School of Nursing. In reality, many nurses get doctorate degrees and conduct groundbreaking medical research. Yet driven, science-minded women and men can feel alienated going into the profession if they view it as less respectable than physicians.
Sandy Summers, the executive director of the non-profit The Truth About Nursing, said unflattering images of nurses can also perpetuate stereotypes that nurses aren't skilled medical researchers, which impedes their ability to get funding. Earlier this summer, National Institutes of Health named a dentist in charge of one of the country's biggest nursing research institutions. Summers and her organization challenged NIH to appoint a nurse.
"When people don't respect nurses, they don't fund their work," Sandy Summers told Business Insider. "They don't think we do anything meaningful. It doesn't take a college degree to provide somebody with sexual services."
How "sexy nurses" can increase workplace harassment
Beyond just inaccurate portrayals, "sexy nurse" costumes may perpetuate something more sinister: workplace harassment.
Anywhere between 60% to 87% of nurses experience sexual harassment at work, according to a 2006 review of literature conducted by Pacific Union College professor Tammy McGuire. Similarly, a 2018 poll of 569 nurses found 71% of them had been harassed by a patient.
Kristen Choi, a practicing RN who works at a mental health hospital in Los Angeles, said she "consistently" gets sexually harassed at work. Most of her patients respect her, but some call her "baby" or make comments on her appearance while she treats them. She even recalled an instance where a patient asked to take off her clothes and get into bed with her.
Choi said scandalous Halloween costumes can reinforce the idea that nurses are "sexy," which can normalize problematic behavior and make it easier for men to say harassing comments while she's at work.
"Sexualizing any profession that's mostly women may feel harmless, but it's creating a caricature and it really does translate to real world harm whether you intended to or not," Choi told Business Insider.
Kullack, too, concluded the crude nurse costume she saw on Facebook must have occurred partly due to a lack of adequate workplace harassment training.
"This feels like misogyny," Kullack added. "No one should ever wear a sexy nurse costume. It's a subtle jab at our profession."
If you're a nurse with a story to share, email aakhtar@bjinnox.com.
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