Male Participation in Nursing Sees Significant Rise in the U.S.
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Authored by Dr. Pam Vollmer, DNP, RN, AMB-BC, NPD-BC, CEO and Director of Content at CE Ready
The surge in male participation in nursing is a testament to the changing attitudes towards gender roles in the workplace. Traditionally viewed as a female-dominated field, nursing is now increasingly recognized for the diverse and rewarding career opportunities it offers, regardless of gender. This change is fueled by a combination of societal evolution and the intrinsic appeal of nursing as a career.
What Nurses Need to Know
Men now represent approximately 10–12% of the U.S. registered nursing workforce, depending on the data source — up from an estimated 2.7% in 1970. According to the 2024 National Nursing Workforce Survey conducted by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing, the proportion of male RNs reached 11.2% in 2022 before slipping slightly to 10.4% in 2024, suggesting that growth has plateaued in recent years even as long-term trends remain positive.
Male nurses are disproportionately represented in advanced practice roles — approximately 40% of certified registered nurse anesthetists are men, according to the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists. Despite real progress, significant barriers remain: persistent gender stereotypes, limited peer representation, and professional cultures that have not always made male nurses feel fully welcome. A more gender-diverse nursing workforce benefits everyone — nurses, teams, and most importantly, patients. This post covers what the data actually shows and what it will take to keep the profession moving forward.
She was four days post-op and frightened in a way she could not fully name. Her male nurse spent twenty minutes with her — not rushing, not charting from the doorway. He sat down. He asked what was worrying her. What she needed that day was not a clinical intervention. It was a human one. The gender of her nurse was irrelevant to the quality of that care. The willingness to be present was everything. That is what this conversation is actually about.
Where Things Stand: The Numbers on Men in Nursing
The long arc of male participation in nursing is a story of genuine and significant change — even if the most recent data gives reason for a more nuanced read.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, men represent approximately 12% of the U.S. nursing workforce as of 2024. That is a fourfold increase from the estimated 2.7% of male nurses recorded in 1970. More than 215,000 men joined the nursing field as LPNs, RNs, and nurse practitioners between 2002 and 2022, according to BLS data analyzed by NurseJournal.
The 2024 National Nursing Workforce Survey from the National Council of State Boards of Nursing offers a more precise and slightly more cautious picture: the proportion of male RNs grew from 8% in 2015 to 11.2% in 2022, then slipped to 10.4% in 2024. That slight decrease warrants attention. The growth in male nursing is real and meaningful — but it is not accelerating.
Where men are most visible in nursing is in advanced practice roles. Male nurse practitioners grew from approximately 9,400 to over 29,700 between 2011 and 2022. And approximately 40% of all certified registered nurse anesthetists are men — a striking figure in a field where women dominate overall.
These numbers describe progress. They also describe how much room remains.
What Is Driving More Men Into Nursing
Several converging forces have contributed to the growth in male nursing over the past few decades, and understanding them helps clarify what would need to change for that growth to resume.
Economic shifts have played a larger role than many nursing conversations acknowledge. The United States has lost more than 7 million manufacturing jobs since the mid-20th century, according to research published in Nursing Outlook. As traditionally male-dominated industries contracted, health and social assistance occupations expanded — projected to add 2.6 million jobs between 2021 and 2031. Men who might once have entered manufacturing or trades are increasingly looking at healthcare as a viable, stable, and well-compensated career path.
Salary and job security are real draws. The median annual salary for RNs was $86,070 in 2023, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, with advanced practice nurses earning a median of $129,480. These are numbers that speak for themselves in a competitive job market.
Changing representation matters too. More male nurses in senior and visible roles — including the American Nurses Association’s first male president, Ernest Grant, PhD, RN, FAAN — send a signal to men considering nursing that there is a place for them and a path forward.
What Still Gets in the Way
Despite real progress, barriers to male participation in nursing are persistent and documented. Understanding them matters because unaddressed barriers slow growth — which is part of what the 2024 data may be reflecting.
The most consistent barrier is stereotyping. Nursing has been culturally coded as women’s work for so long that men entering the profession often face assumptions from colleagues, patients, and even family members that they made an unusual or lesser choice. That kind of friction has real effects on who enters programs, who stays, and who thrives.
Research published in Nursing Outlook found that to increase male representation in nursing, institutions need to simultaneously rearticulate what it means for a profession to be “female” while also demonstrating that nursing incorporates skills and values not historically coded by gender at all — critical thinking, physical stamina, leadership under pressure, and technical competence alongside compassionate presence.
Male nursing students also frequently report limited peer representation in educational settings, which can create feelings of isolation during training. Mentorship programs that connect male nursing students with practicing male nurses in their area of interest make a measurable difference in retention.
There is also a wage complexity worth naming honestly. Data consistently shows that male nurses earn more than female nurses on average — attributed largely to specialty clustering in higher-paying roles. That disparity does not reflect well on a profession committed to equity, and it is part of a larger conversation about pay equity in nursing that has not yet been adequately resolved.
What Men Bring to Nursing Teams
The case for gender diversity in nursing is not about replacing the workforce that built the profession. It is about the documented benefits of diverse teams in healthcare — for problem-solving, for patient experience, and for the sustainability of the profession as a whole.
Research consistently shows that diverse healthcare teams produce better outcomes: more varied approaches to clinical problem-solving, stronger team cohesion, and patient populations who feel more represented in their care. Some male patients are more comfortable discussing certain health concerns with a male provider. Some clinical situations benefit from physical strength. These are practical realities alongside the broader equity argument.
It is also worth naming what the illustrative stories from within nursing suggest. Consider a composite scenario familiar to many nurse educators: a man with a background in emergency response enters a nursing program expecting the clinical pace to feel familiar — and finds instead that what challenges him most is the emotional labor, the relational presence, the sustained attention to what a patient is not saying. He learns it. He becomes skilled at it. His presence adds something to his team that was not there before — not because of his gender, but because of his particular path to it.
That is what genuine inclusion produces: nurses with different backgrounds, different entry points, and different strengths, all working toward the same goal.
What Schools and Healthcare Systems Can Do
The data suggests that growth in male nursing is possible but not automatic. It requires intentional effort at multiple levels.
Nursing programs can invest in recruitment strategies that address men as an underrepresented population — the American Association of Colleges of Nursing has explicitly called for this. Mentorship programs that connect male students with male nurses in clinical settings reduce isolation and increase retention. Curricula that examine the history of gender in nursing openly, rather than treating it as a footnote, give students the context they need to understand and navigate the profession.
Healthcare systems can examine whether their cultures are genuinely inclusive of male nurses — whether assumptions about patient assignment, peer dynamics, and advancement opportunities are being applied fairly. A profession that asks men to advocate for change while not fully welcoming them creates the conditions for the plateau the 2024 data may be signaling.
Individual nurses — male and female — can be intentional about mentorship, about normalizing male presence at every level of nursing, and about challenging the kind of casual stereotyping that still surfaces in too many clinical environments.
Continuing Education and Professional Growth for Every Nurse
One of the most consistent themes in the research on men in nursing is the value of continuing education in advancing careers — particularly in specialty areas where male nurses are most concentrated. CE that builds clinical depth, leadership skill, or specialized certification supports career advancement for every nurse, regardless of gender.
CE Ready is an ANCC-accredited nursing CE provider (Provider #P0986) based in Florida, offering online nursing CEUs that nurses can complete from home, at their own pace, on topics that genuinely interest them. Whether you are deepening a clinical specialty, building leadership skills, or meeting your state renewal requirements, CE Ready’s full course library offers options across a wide range of professional and clinical topics.
Not sure what your state requires? CE Ready’s state CE requirements guide has current requirements in one place. And getting started with CE Ready is simple and takes just a few minutes.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What percentage of nurses in the US are male?
A: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, men represent approximately 12% of the U.S. nursing workforce as of 2024. The NCSBN’s 2024 National Nursing Workforce Survey puts the figure at 10.4% of RNs specifically — a slight decline from 11.2% in 2022, suggesting that growth in male nursing has plateaued in recent years even as the long-term trend remains positive. Both figures represent a dramatic increase from the estimated 2.7% of nurses who were male in 1970.
Q: What nursing specialties have the highest percentage of male nurses?
A: Male nurses are significantly overrepresented in advanced practice roles, particularly nurse anesthesia. According to the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists, men make up approximately 40% of all certified registered nurse anesthetists — far higher than their overall proportion of the nursing workforce. Men are also more commonly found in emergency, critical care, and flight nursing specialties.
Q: What barriers do male nurses commonly face?
A: The most consistent barriers are persistent gender stereotyping — both from outside and within the profession — limited peer representation in educational settings, and clinical cultures that have not always been fully welcoming. Research published in Nursing Outlook emphasizes that meaningful change requires both cultural reframing and active institutional recruitment and mentorship strategies, not passive openness.
Q: Is gender diversity in nursing actually good for patient care?
A: The evidence supports it. Diverse healthcare teams consistently demonstrate stronger clinical problem-solving, better team dynamics, and broader patient representation. Some patients are more comfortable discussing certain health concerns with a male provider. And the variety of life experiences and entry paths that a more diverse workforce brings to clinical situations strengthens nursing practice overall.
Q: How can nursing programs recruit more male students?
A: The American Association of Colleges of Nursing has called for intentional recruitment of men as an underrepresented population. Effective strategies include targeted outreach to men in career transition, mentorship programs connecting male students with practicing male nurses, and curricula that address the history and culture of gender in nursing openly. Representation — seeing male nurses in visible leadership and clinical roles — is one of the most powerful recruitment tools available.
References
Martsolf, G. R., et al. (2023). Describing the male registered nursing workforce toward increasing male representation in professional nursing. Nursing Outlook, 71(3). https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0029655423001860
National Council of State Boards of Nursing. (2025). The 2024 National Nursing Workforce Survey. Journal of Nursing Regulation, 16(1), S1–S88. https://www.ncsbn.org/research/recent-research/workforce/2024-workforce-rn.page
NurseJournal. (2024). Male nurse statistics: A look at the numbers. https://nursejournal.org/articles/male-nurse-statistics/