In an opinion piece, a nurse begins his advice to the new Congress by citing his own credentials: Once again, Americans in 2016 ranked nurses as the country’s most trusted professionals.

Writing on the Oxford University Press blog, Mark Lazenby, PhD, APRN, FAAN, associate professor of nursing at Yale University, gently compares the regard for his profession with that given to elected officials. He goes on: Not only do nurses pass national certification exams, they “truly demonstrate their competence by delivering quality patient care day after day.”

But Congress can disappoint, says Lazenby, who calls on representatives to remember their sense of public service—and take a page from how nurses behave.