Best Nursing Quotes

8 I love to read great quotes that are related to nursing. One of the my favorite nursing quotes is:

"They may forget your name but they will never forget how you made them feel."
- Maya Angelou

Please share your favorite nursing quotes that are either specifically related to nursing or that are relevant to nursing. Please site the author of the quote if known.

Also, please click the kudos button to indicate your favorite quotes nurses share. (fyi, only logged in members see the kudos button, New to allnurses? Take a minute and register free today)
Last edit by brian on May 16, '11
"I'm sorry our pillows aren't like the Hilton. One day we will strive to get better pillows" - My preceptor in my 2nd year of nursing school, ortho rotation (Male patient got both his knees done b/c his friends in a private hospital got "drinks and meals and the best beds".

Constant attention by a good nurse may be just as important as a major operation by a surgeon. -Dag Hammarskjold

THESE ARE MY FAVORITE ONES! "I wanna do something that matters, say something different. Something that sets the whole world on it's ear. I want to do something better with the time I've been given, and I want to try to touch a few hearts in this life. Leave nothin' less than something that says 'I Was Here'"‎"You treat a disease: You win, you lose. You treat a person, I guarantee you win. No matter the outcome."

"When I wake up in the morning, I want alarm bells to go off in Hell and the Devil to snarl, 'Oh, crap, she's awake!'"

When I think about all the patients and their loved ones that I have worked with over the years, I know most of them don't remember me nor I them. But I do know that I gave a little piece of myself to each of them and they to me and those threads make up the beautiful tapestry in my mind that is my career in nursing. ~Donna Wilk Cardillo, A Daybook for Beginning Nurses

"To do what nobody else will do, in a way that nobody else can do, in spite of all we go through... that is what it is to be a nurse."- Rawsi WilliamsLove this... and this thread! Keep em coming!

"I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.", Helen Keller

"You might be a Nurse if you believe every Patient needs TLC: Thorazine, Lorazepam, and Compazine."

I used part of this on my graduation announcementsNursing is an art: and if it is to be made an art, it requires an exclusive devotion as hard a preparation, as any painter's or sculptor's work; for what is the having to do with dead canvas or dead marble, compared with having to do with the living body, the temple of God's spirit? It is one of the Fine Arts: I had almost said, the finest of Fine Arts. ~Florence Nightingale

"I'll be back in two shakes" my most common quote to my patients : )

"You know what you gotta do when life gets you down?Just keep swimmingJust keep swimmingJust keep swimming swimming swimmingWhat do we do we swim, swim, swimOH HO HO How I love to swimWhen you WAAAAAANNTTT to swim you want to"~~~Dory, Finding NemoThis mantra goes through my head quite a lot during a stressful shift. How can you have this going through your hea and not smile..AND keep swimming?!

"One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it." --Sidney Howard"Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional." --M. Kathleen Casey"There is no paycheck that can equal the feeling of contentment that comes from being the person you are meant to be." --Oprah Winfrey"I am doing the best I can given what I have today." --Jillian Michaels