From a national sample of 220 subjects, 45 nurses who had worked in special care units for at least six months were studied to determine what differences existed between these nurses and those who had worked only in regular hospital units. Scores of the two groups were compared on two tests. Corwin's Bureaucratic and Professional Role Conceptions and Role Deprivation Test and Kramer's Integrative Hole Behavior. The prediction that SCC nurses would have higher professional and bureaucratic role conceptions than nurses working in other regular hospital units was not supported. However, subjects who dropped out of nursing from both groups had significantly higher professional role configurations. The prediction that SCC nurses would develop higher integrative role behavior (to handle conflict) was supported in part, i.e., for all except SCC dropouts. An SCC questionnaire was used to determine if SCC nurses perceived opportunities to combine instrumental and expressive role functions. Findings indicated that 80 per cent of the nurses who stated that they had no problem combining these two role functions are no longer working in SCC's.