Can a color blind person be a nurse?

[Haji]

A question for those of you who are going to school for nursing or have been nurses, can you tell me if someone who's color blind can become a nurse? Does the work require to distinguish colors? A friend of mine (male) who's thinking about becoming a nurse but has trouble differentiating red from green or vise versa? Do you think he can become a good nurse or would he have problem being a color blind? Thanks for you responses.

[nursinghumor]

Hello Haji,

If a blind person can become a nurse, a color blind person should be able to. The question then is what type of nursing will they expect to be able to do.

The nursing school will be expected to reasonably accommodate the student as far as finding alternate ways of teaching/testing. It may or may not be feasible.

However, to accommodate a blind/color blind nurse in a hospital so that they would be able to do actual patient care, may go beyond the reasonable limits of cost, etc.

Your friend will need to keep that in mind before he starts school. Completely blind nurses have gotten through school and gotten licensed. What happens afterwards, you need to think about and plan for.

There are some helpful resources in this article:

"The NFB compiled numerous examples of how other blind individuals have used alternative (non-sighted) techniques to complete their medical and other healthcare studies. After considering the information, NCC agreed to admit Ms. Resnick to NCC's nursing program."
http://www.medilexicon.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=19122

Best wishes,

Andrew Lopez, RN
http://www.4nursing.com