Nurse Coloring Pages

• Nurses at work: listening with a stethoscope, reading a chart and wrapping a blood pressure cuff around an arm
• School nurse: an office with a cot, an ice pack and a jar of bandages
• Baby nurse: a nurse in the nursery weighing a newborn on a scale
• Home and community nurses: a visiting nurse with a bag at a front door and a nurse giving a flu shot at a clinic
• Tools of the job: stethoscope, thermometer, bandage roll, clipboard, badge and first aid kit
• Thank-you pages: "Thank you, nurses" lettering with hearts and a blank card for a message

If you're using these pages for career day or a community helpers unit, here's a plain way to explain the job.

Nurses take care of people who are sick or hurt and help healthy people stay well. They check vital signs, which are four basic measurements: temperature, heart rate, breathing rate and blood pressure. They give medicine, clean and cover wounds, and explain what's going on to patients and families. Doctors and nurses work as a team, and in a hospital the nurse is usually the person a patient sees most.

Nurses work in many places: hospitals, schools, doctors' offices, nursing homes, people's houses, helicopters and ships. Hospitals need them around the clock, so many nurses work nights and weekends.

In the United States, National Nurses Week runs from May 6 to May 12 every year. It's a good time to color a thank-you page and drop it off at a clinic, a school nurse's office or a hospital front desk. A child who is nervous about a checkup or a shot can also color a nurse page beforehand while you talk through what will happen.