Nurses should be banned from showing tattoos while treating patients (Image: Getty)
It was hard to fault the service offered by the outpatients’ phlebotomy department of my local NHS hospital. Appointments ran on time, the staff were unwaveringly cheerful, the room where tests were carried out seemed clean and orderly. Yet what made me shrink in horror as a nurse prepared to extract a vial of blood wasn’t the size of the needle. Rather it was the image inked up the length of her forearm. Not the image itself – some kind of curling flower with lettering on its spreading leaves – since it was hardly the stuff of skull and crossbones. But rather the fact there was anything there at all.
In my mind, there’s nothing like a tattoo to fault confidence when it comes to the provision of our health care. This inky skin graffiti, however beautifully drawn, semaphoring distracting messages to the already vulnerable patient. In the crisp, smart and hopefully antiseptic world of modern medicine, a tattoo suggests revolution and rebellion as well as detracting from the otherwise professionalism of the environment. Worse still – and admittedly this is without empirical evidence – it looks dirty and unhygienic. In my mind it`s boxed in the same corner as mucky fingernails or a grubby uniform. Even though today’s well regulated tattoo parlours are scrupulously clean and one would hope a nurse or other medical practitioner would recognise it if it wasn’t.
At a time when there’s a desperate urge to upgrade and improve the NHS – be it through money or as has been suggested this week, the use of AI – surely this will fail if it can’t deliver a service which takes pride in appearance and the impression it creates.
Of course, those who have a tattoo may well disagree. And there’s no disputing their popularity – one YouGov survey found that 26% of the UK population have tattoos. A situation reflected in the size of the tattoo industry – with revenue estimated to have reached £713.4 million last year.
What’s more, society constantly clamours to indulge the cult of the individual and allow room for self expression. The tattoo is surely emblematic of all this, especially since many are bespoke in their design, reflecting perhaps favourite quotes, an important milestone, a dash of cultural heritage – or in the case of the nurse who took my blood, the names of her children. Indeed, when, in the name of etiquette and distraction – I`m a wuss when it comes to having blood taken – I asked about the design, she told me it was about her brood blossoming like a flowering plant. Sweet, eh? Yet not sweet enough that I couldn`t be distracted by how out of place it seemed in such a clinical setting.
I simply don’t believe tattoos should be visibly on display in a medical situation. And if we are to have an NHS which is smart, efficient and fit for purpose, then the appearance of its staff must reflect that.
There is some room to enforce this. Tattoos are not a protected characteristic. So employers can legally ask their staff to cover up such body art – surely reasonable in a customer-facing role like medicine. It seems complete anathema to do otherwise.
Most NHS trusts are said to expect nurses to cover their tattoos, particularly if they are visible to patients. But in my own experience, this has not been enforced.
Inevitably, given the popularity of tattoos many may well baulk at such a view. Claiming that this is prejudicial towards those who love to ink their skin. That in demanding tattoos be covered this is about giving into societal pressure to conform. Truthfully, it`s far simpler. This is not because of a blinkered stigma which presumes anyone who has a tattoo is a thug, a wino or a druggie. Rather it is because body art and the impression of clinical professionalism are mutually exclusive. Tattoos look unclean. Whether they are or not may simply be about optics. But impressions matter. Especially in the NHS and at a time when our confidence in the health service is at rock bottom and there is such a spirit of malaise and failure prevailing about the care it delivers.
The only needles I want to think about when I go for a blood test are the ones plunging into my arm. Not those filled with ink which leave an indelible impression – often for all the wrong reasons.