FAIRHOPE — Ask Donna Nolte how things have changed since she’s been a nurse and you’ll hear the good, the bad and the downright ugly.

While growing technology enables nurses to do an even better job of caring for patients these days, the number of men and women entering the profession continues to dwindle. Simultaneously, Americans are living longer, Baby Boomers are aging, and hospitals are facing growing pains as there is more demand than ever for a fixed number of beds.

Speaking recently to graduating nursing students at Bishop State Community College in Mobile, Nolte discussed with them their chosen profession. She said she told them a story about a time she was on the road when a man in a store correctly guessed she was a nurse, telling her she “looked like a nurse.”

Nolte said it’s understandable because, “The way we relate to problems is different. The way we treat and react to people is different because of what we’ve experienced.”

She said young nurses have “a big old spark in their eyes. That’s going to die down a bit.” Nolte advised the graduates that when it happens, to not “look inside yourself for why you went into nursing. Look outward to the patients and the families. People always want to look inward. In our profession, it’s not about us. It’s about them.”

Nolte (RN, BSN, CCRN), director of third-floor postoperative surgery services at Thomas Hospital in Fairhope, said nurses do suffer from job burnout from time to time, as do those in many other professions. Many overcome it, she said, by remembering how they have helped others, even when the outcome was less than hoped.

“It’s the magnitude that your smile and your face is the last thing they see before they left the Earth,” Nolte said. “Sometimes I’ve thought ‘am I worthy of that’ and the answer is yes. It brings it back into focus for you.”

The Barnwell resident and mother of three (a 13-year-old son and two daughters, 11 years old and 18 months old) doesn’t really know what drew her into the profession.

“I just remember always wanting to be a nurse and that’s always what I’ve done,” she said. Nolte became a nurse in 1989, and has worked at Thomas Hospital for nearly 15 years.

She called nursing “a totally different job now. It’s not just treatments and medicines. We must meet commission requirements, take care of documentation and paperwork. We make sure they (patients) have the right meds in the hospital and when they go back out. There’s a lot of follow-up, but it adds up to better patient care.”

Not as many are taking the same path these days. Nolte said registered nurses and other licensed nurses are more difficult to find when needed. Even positions such as non-licensed nursing assistants and patient care technicians (PCT) remain vacant longer than they did before Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast two years ago.

She pointed out PCTs perform “backbreaking work. They are so close to the bedside of the patients. They do it because they have a passion for taking care of the patients. They are like your right arm when you’re in the hospital.”

Nolte added, “Consequently, they’re the nurses’ left arm. When you don’t have a good one, it’s very difficult.”

Infirmary Health System, the nonprofit parent of Thomas Hospital, requires those seeking certain positions on the medical support staff be experienced or able to complete a certification course.

Nolte said Thomas has developed a training program through the hospital’s clinical education department.

“We pay them $300 a week and they take a four-week course,” she said. “It’s a loan, and if they stay with us for six months, the loan is forgiven.”

Nolte is looking forward to the completion of a new emergency department and patient care wing now under construction at Thomas Hospital. Some of the department she oversees will relocate there, and be welcomed by new technology.

One new feature will be a call system that enables a patient to call their nurse no matter where they are. Using the current system, patients reach a central call station and the nurses must be located. She said, “There will be a lot more opportunities in the new tower.”

When not on duty, Nolte enjoys spending time with her family, playing with her children, watching movies, reading and listening to music. A huge Harry Potter fan, she said she loves the idea of soon combining old and new technology by listening to audio books on her iPod.