Synopsis: From stampeding nudes to inebriated teenagers, young nurse Michael Alexander never really knew what he was getting himself into. But now, sixteen years since he was first launched into his nursing career – as the only man in a gynaecology ward – he’s pretty much dealt with everything: body parts that come off in his hands; teenagers with phantom pregnancies; doctors unable to tell the difference between their left and right; violent drunks; singing relatives; sexism… and a whole lot of nudity.
Title: Confessions of a Male Nurse
Author: Michael Alexander
Publisher: The Friday Project
Pages: 336
ISBN: 9780007469543
Rating: 
I started this book on my way to the airport for a weekend in France, and finished halfway through the plane ride. That’s 336 pages in roughly 2 hours, which means I really enjoyed the book – although at the time I did grumble about lending my Kindle to my plane buddy and having to read the in-flight magazine for the rest of the journey.
Confessions of a Male Nurse is as funny as it is shocking; we are thrown into the life of a male nurse who starts his career in a gynaecology department – you really can’t make this stuff up! Alexander is humorous and brutally honest and shows that there’s more to nurses than bandages and blood pressure monitors.
With all the talk of NHS budget cuts, I would recommend this book to anyone who agrees with them. Alexander shows us that, despite the best intentions of our doctors and nurses, there is much more that needs to be done to improve the system, and cutting the budget is not one of those things.
OK, rant over. Confessions of a Male Nurse will make you laugh, maybe cry (I would have teared up if I wasn’t waiting to get on a plane); it will make you reflect on your visits to the hospital and how you were as a patient/visitor. But most of all, it will deepen your existing respect for the nursing profession.
A Literary Mind 