90 Nurse Quotes To Uplift And Honor Our Heroes

To honor our nurses, we wanted to share some of our favorite inspirational and humorous quotes. Many of the quotes are from unknown authors, but we bet most of them came from nurses! Share one or two of these quotes to thank your favorite nurse today.

Inspirational Nurse Quotes

• "As a nurse we have the opportunity to heal the mind, soul, heart, and body of our patients. They may forget your name but they will never forget how you made them feel." —Maya Angelou
• "No matter how difficult the days may get, don't forget the reason you became a nurse." —Unknown
• "Nurse: just another word to describe a person strong enough to tolerate everything and soft enough to understand everyone." —Unknown
• "Every nurse has that one patient that they'll remember forever." —Unknown
• "The character of the nurse is as important as the knowledge she possesses." —Carolyn Jarvis
• “When you are a nurse, you know that every day you will touch a life or a life will touch yours.” —Unknown
• “Our fingerprints don’t fade from the lives we touch.” —Judy Blume
• “To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived, this is to have succeeded.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “Let us never consider ourselves finished, nurses. We must be learning all of our lives.” —Florence Nightingale
• “Just so you know, doctors are here to diagnose, not heal. We heal.” —Edie Falco in Nurse Jackie
• “When I think about all the patients and their loved ones 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 tapestry that is my career in nursing.” —Donna Wilk Cardillo, MA, RN, CSP

• "I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took any excuse." —Florence Nightingale
• “Being a nurse means to hold all your own tears and start drawing smiles on people’s faces.” —Dana Basem
• “Nurses are always there, you care for us from the earliest years. You look after us in our happiest and saddest times. And for many, you look after us and our families at the end of our lives. Your dedication and professionalism are awe-inspiring.” —Duchess Kate Middleton
• “A nurse is one who opens the eyes of a newborn and gently closes the eyes of a dying man. It is indeed a high blessing to be the first and last to witness the beginning and end of life.” —Unknown
• “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” —William Shakespeare

Funny Nurse Quotes

• "Don't mess with me, I get paid to stab people with sharp objects." —Unknown
• "Be nice to me…I may be your nurse someday and remember…catheters and needles come in sizes that I choose!" —Unknown
• "May your cup runneth over, unless it's that urine specimen cup you're trying to hand me." —Unknown
• “Be nice to your nurse. They’re the person who chooses your catheter size.” —Unknown
• “Nursing would be a dream job if there were no doctors.” —Gerhard Kocher
• “Always thank your nurse! Sometimes they’re the only one between you and a hearse.” —Warren Beatty
• “Yes, I am a nurse. No, I don’t want to look at it.” —Unknown
• “Not all angels have wings… some have scrubs.” —Unknown
• “May your scrubs be comfy, your coffee be strong, and your Monday be short.” —Unknown
• “Remember, I’m a nurse. You’re going to have to say a lot to gross me out.” —Unknown
• “I’m a nurse. What’s your superpower?” —Unknown

• “Shift change is my favorite time of day.” —Unknown
• “You know you’re a nurse when your finger has gone places you never thought possible.” —Unknown
• “Nurse: the first person you see after saying, ‘Hold my beer and watch this!’” —Unknown
• “Nurses can’t fix stupid… but we can sedate it.” —Unknown
• “I love being a nurse, but I mostly love wearing scrubs. They’re basically professional pajamas.” —Unknown
• “I came, I cared, I charted” —Unknown
• “You think Mondays are bad? Try working weekends, holidays, and 12 hour nights” —Unknown
• “No, RN does not stand for ‘Refreshments and Narcotics.’” —Unknown
• “Hand sanitizer has started to become your best friend.” —Unknown
• “I’ve come to the realization that I’ll touch anything as long as I have gloves on.” —Unknown
• “You know you work in healthcare when you can discuss puke and bowel movements at the lunch table and no one flinches.” —Unknown
• “Sometimes I have to remind myself around my non-nurse friends not to talk about bodily functions.” —Unknown

Quotes That Show Appreciation

• “It would not be possible to praise nurses too highly.” —Stephen Ambrose
• "Nurses dispense comfort, compassion, and caring without even a prescription." —Val Saintsbury
• “America’s nurses are the beating heart of our medical system.” —Barack Obama
• “Nurses are a unique kind. They have this insatiable need to care for others, which is both their biggest strength and fatal flaw.” —Dr. Jean Watsonla
• “A nurse will always give us hope, an angel with a stethoscope.” —Carrie Latet
• “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed people can change the world, indeed it is the only thing that ever has.” —Margaret Mead
• “Constant attention by a good nurse may be just as important as a major operation by a surgeon.” —Dag Hammarskjold
• “Remember, nurses are like icebergs. At any one time, you are only seeing what they are actually doing.” —Ian Miller
  

• “Nurses are the hospitality of the hospital.” —Carrie Latet
• “Bound by paperwork, short on hands, sleep, and energy…nurses are rarely short on caring.” —Sharon Hudacek
• “Nurses—one of the few blessings of being ill.” —Sara Moss-Wolfe
• "You didn't even know me, yet you treated me like family…I'll never forget that. Thank you." —Unknown
• “The nurse is temporarily the consciousness of the unconscious, the love of life of the suicidal, the leg of the amputee, the eyes of the newly blind, a means of locomotion for the newborn, knowledge, and confidence for the young mother, a voice for those too weak to speak, and so on.” —Virginia Henderson, RN
• "The doctors may be mapping out the war games, but it is the nurses who make the conflict bearable. —Jodi Picoult
• “Nursing is one of the fine arts: I had almost said ‘the finest of fine arts.’” —Florence Nightingale

Motivational Quotes for Nurses

• "Be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a battle." —Plato
• “I’m not telling you it’s going to be easy, I’m telling you it’s going to be worth it.” —Art Williams
• “You treat a disease: you win, you lose. You treat a person, I guarantee you win...no matter the outcome.” —Robin Williams, Patch Adams
• “Never give up on anybody. Miracles happen every day.” —H. Jackson Brown Jr.
• “To do what nobody else will do, a way that nobody else can do, in spite of all we go through; that is to be a nurse.” —Rawsi Williams
• “Knowing is better than wondering, waking is better than sleeping, and even the biggest failure, even the worst, beats the hell out of never trying.” —Grey’s Anatomy
• “It is not how much you do, but how much love you put into doing”. —Mother Teresa
• “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” —Mahatma Gandhi
• “Where the needs of the world and your talents cross, there lies your vocation.” —Aristotle
• “There are only four kinds of people in the world. Those who have been caregivers. Those who are currently caregivers. Those who will be caregivers, and those who will need a caregiver.” —Rosalyn Carter
• “Some days there won’t be a song in your heart. Sing anyway.” —Emory Austin

• "Save one life, you're a hero. Save a hundred lives, you're a nurse." —Unknown
• “What you do makes a difference. And you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.” —Jane Goodall
• “Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier.” —Mother Teresa
• “Have a heart that never hardens, a temper that never tires, a touch that never hurts.” —Charles Dickens
• “A nurse is not what you do. It is what you are…. I am a nurse. It’s not what I do, it’s what I am.” —Unknown
• “Treat the patient as a whole, not just the hole in the patient.” —Unknown
• “Nursing 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.” —Florence Nightingale
• “Every nurse was drawn to nursing because of a desire to care, to serve, or to help.” —Christina Feist-Heilmeier, RN
• “The character of the nurse is as important as the knowledge she possesses.” —Carolyn Jarvis
• “The very first requirement in a hospital is that it should do the sick no harm.”—Florence Nightingale

Short Quotes for Nurses

• "Nurses are the heart of healthcare." —Donna Wilk Cardillo
• “For the sick, it is important to have the best.” —Florence Nightingale
• “From caring comes courage.” —Lao Tzu
• “Be the nurse you want to work with.” —Unknown
• “Treat every patient like they are family.” —Unknown
• "No act of kindness, however small, is ever wasted." —Aesop
• “It is not enough to be compassionate—you must act.” —The Dalai Lama
• “I never dreamed about success—I worked for it.” —Estée Lauder

• “A nurse is compassion in scrubs” —Lexie Saige
• “Nurses are angels in comfortable shoes.” —Unknown
• “I’m a nurse because miracle worker isn’t an official title.” —Unknown
• “Sometimes I inspire my patients; more often, they inspire me.” —Unknown
• “Be the nurse you would want as a patient.” —Unknown
• “What angels are to the sad, nurses are to the sick.” —Amit Kalantri
• “Caring is the essence of nursing.” —Jean Watson