I've been a registered nurse for 43 years and now am a nursing professor in the middle of Texas. It saddens my heart to hear my students' tales of what they are having to face daily. I can't do direct patient care anymore because of my own health but do my best to support those who can. But compassion fatigue is real. The angry is real, especially when a child dies because of an adult's selfish and stupid decisions. We are going to find the nursing shortage getting worse and worse as burnout increases. It is so sad that a public health crisis became a political nightmare!
Thank you so much for writing this. Yes, we appreciate and sympathize with our exhausted health care staff so much. I'm going to have my second total knee surgery next week and am so grateful that the dedicated staff will still be there despite the awfulness they've gone through. Kudos!
“Freedom” must be the must over-used and mis-used word in US politics. It almost always seems to be shorthand for “my freedom to do whatever I want regardless of the consequences”.
Thank you Dan. Thank you to all the Healthcare professionals. I was a CNA/Nurse.
I stopped my profession when I fell. I still feel guilty not returning to help the Elderly/ Rehab patients. I still pray for my former employees to get through these tough times.
As the father of a doctor who is regularly seeing patients who have COVID, I could not agree more. The old adage “your right to swing your arm ends where my nose begins” is applicable here. By failing to take easy, reasonable precautions, you are not only placing yourself at risk from this disease - you are also placing at risk everyone with whom you come in contact, and indeed everyone with whom THEY come in contact. It is selfish, plain and simple. (For those very few people for whom there is a serious health risk in taking the vaccine, I’m not talking about you. No one else has an excuse.) And for healthcare workers, for whom exposure is necessary and constant, your failure to take precautions is truly appalling.
With the scope of this current pandemic state across this country, and the attention some of our beloved Republican governors are attracting with their ridiculous mask mandates for our school children, the schools, and the like, it is no wonder the healthcare workers are feeling as they do.
I want to take this opportunity to send a special thank you to all of the healthcare workers, doctors, hospital staff, doctor's office staff, clinicians, paramedics, front line workers, firefighters, and police officers. (I hope, and pray, I haven't forgotten anyone on this list. If so, forgive me, because you are included).
What these folks have been through day in, day out is nothing short of a miracle they are still walking or able to function. The biggest part of them are working double shifts, and for those of you that don't know, that's 16 plus hours a day, probably 7 days a week, to combat this disease, and cared for those that have contracted it.
I have been paying attention to the news, MSNBC mostly, and I have noticed the doctors in Palm Beach Gardens from the hospital there holding a "sit-in" outside the hospital after their shift. Again, most all of them had just pulled double shift, to try to convince people to please get vaccinated, how they feel when a patient passes away from this disease, and the gruesome death they suffer.
I don't understand what it will take for people to get the vaccination. How many people, friends, family members, have to die before the rock falls and hit s these people in the head, knocking some sense into them.
Folks, the bottom line is this. I don't know what your lifestyle was before the pandemic started 18+ months ago. But, whatever it was, forget it. It's over. Long gone. We have a new lifestyle now. Mask, social distancing, extra special care of cleanliness. Personally, I lay a lot of the blame on the past administration on this situation. That, and the ignorance of the sheep that still follow his word.
We are killing our healthcare, and front-line workers by overworking them. Our hospitals are beyond full. Tents are being constructed to care for people. Wake up America.
I am 2 years out from a top emergency medicine residency. I have $500,000 in student loan debt. I am an associate in a community private practice, making 1/3 of the partners. I am trying to help my parents financially after their livelihood was destroyed by covid. I am exhausted and scared for this next wave. I have kids who are too young to be vaccinated. Why won’t the government pay for some of our education that got us here to protect as they do our military? Provide us a little breathing room in a pandemic that doesn’t stop and we keep showing up? My shift today was filled with unvaccinated Covid patients, our hospital and ICU is filling up and understaffed. A little financial relief would go a long way, can you help @danrather? Grateful for your words and amplifying our voice.- community ER doc
When the first round of this shit show started I kinda thought “yeah, okay, maybe we nurses didn’t plan for this in our careers but we can do this. We’re educated, we’re trained. We got this!!” Now?? I just feel defeated. As though we risked our lives, our sanity, our mental and physical health to help get as many people through this and all those people who called us heroes turned around and stabbed us in the back!! I’m sick and tired of wearing PPE when half the country can’t be bothered to put on a mask much less get vaccinated.
Thank you Dan. Our oldest daughter is an ER Nurse and our youngest is an ICU Nurse. We worry every day for their well being. We spoke with the youngest who is experiencing Covid PTSD. What will happen to her when she can no longer bear the suffering and death of others? She is not alone! Health Care workers every day throughout the nation face unimaginable hours each day as they head off to work. We are all so very sorry! We are a medical family MD, RN's, Medical Assistants. We all thought that these were careers where we could help people. Never in our wildest imagination, did we ever think something like this was possible. How many heroes, like my daughters, get up each day to face death that could have been avoided. I am a 10th generation American. I am a patriot. To see our nation so broken and not a United States when it really counts is tragic. It is very hard to keep the faith, but somehow, we carry on. I appreciate your sharing on steady and other platforms. You are a gift to us all.
Beautiful message of thanks and appreciation. I just shared it with my friends as I hold the same sense of sadness and gratitude. Well said, Dan and team.
A thoughtful tribute. It seems we've forgotten about our heroes, the afflicted, and the deaths. News programs used to give information daily (if not aloud, at least there was a window with stats). We forget so easily.
Dan Rather....Ditto!!
Yes, thank you for your courage, unending work and continued dedication to provide us with high quality healthcare.
I've been a registered nurse for 43 years and now am a nursing professor in the middle of Texas. It saddens my heart to hear my students' tales of what they are having to face daily. I can't do direct patient care anymore because of my own health but do my best to support those who can. But compassion fatigue is real. The angry is real, especially when a child dies because of an adult's selfish and stupid decisions. We are going to find the nursing shortage getting worse and worse as burnout increases. It is so sad that a public health crisis became a political nightmare!
Thank you so much for writing this. Yes, we appreciate and sympathize with our exhausted health care staff so much. I'm going to have my second total knee surgery next week and am so grateful that the dedicated staff will still be there despite the awfulness they've gone through. Kudos!
You echo my feelings exactly, though I am prone to be judgmental toward the selfish acts of vaccine opposers who are putting everyone else at risk.
“Freedom” must be the must over-used and mis-used word in US politics. It almost always seems to be shorthand for “my freedom to do whatever I want regardless of the consequences”.
Thank you Dan. Thank you to all the Healthcare professionals. I was a CNA/Nurse.
I stopped my profession when I fell. I still feel guilty not returning to help the Elderly/ Rehab patients. I still pray for my former employees to get through these tough times.
As the father of a doctor who is regularly seeing patients who have COVID, I could not agree more. The old adage “your right to swing your arm ends where my nose begins” is applicable here. By failing to take easy, reasonable precautions, you are not only placing yourself at risk from this disease - you are also placing at risk everyone with whom you come in contact, and indeed everyone with whom THEY come in contact. It is selfish, plain and simple. (For those very few people for whom there is a serious health risk in taking the vaccine, I’m not talking about you. No one else has an excuse.) And for healthcare workers, for whom exposure is necessary and constant, your failure to take precautions is truly appalling.
With the scope of this current pandemic state across this country, and the attention some of our beloved Republican governors are attracting with their ridiculous mask mandates for our school children, the schools, and the like, it is no wonder the healthcare workers are feeling as they do.
I want to take this opportunity to send a special thank you to all of the healthcare workers, doctors, hospital staff, doctor's office staff, clinicians, paramedics, front line workers, firefighters, and police officers. (I hope, and pray, I haven't forgotten anyone on this list. If so, forgive me, because you are included).
What these folks have been through day in, day out is nothing short of a miracle they are still walking or able to function. The biggest part of them are working double shifts, and for those of you that don't know, that's 16 plus hours a day, probably 7 days a week, to combat this disease, and cared for those that have contracted it.
I have been paying attention to the news, MSNBC mostly, and I have noticed the doctors in Palm Beach Gardens from the hospital there holding a "sit-in" outside the hospital after their shift. Again, most all of them had just pulled double shift, to try to convince people to please get vaccinated, how they feel when a patient passes away from this disease, and the gruesome death they suffer.
I don't understand what it will take for people to get the vaccination. How many people, friends, family members, have to die before the rock falls and hit s these people in the head, knocking some sense into them.
Folks, the bottom line is this. I don't know what your lifestyle was before the pandemic started 18+ months ago. But, whatever it was, forget it. It's over. Long gone. We have a new lifestyle now. Mask, social distancing, extra special care of cleanliness. Personally, I lay a lot of the blame on the past administration on this situation. That, and the ignorance of the sheep that still follow his word.
We are killing our healthcare, and front-line workers by overworking them. Our hospitals are beyond full. Tents are being constructed to care for people. Wake up America.
I am 2 years out from a top emergency medicine residency. I have $500,000 in student loan debt. I am an associate in a community private practice, making 1/3 of the partners. I am trying to help my parents financially after their livelihood was destroyed by covid. I am exhausted and scared for this next wave. I have kids who are too young to be vaccinated. Why won’t the government pay for some of our education that got us here to protect as they do our military? Provide us a little breathing room in a pandemic that doesn’t stop and we keep showing up? My shift today was filled with unvaccinated Covid patients, our hospital and ICU is filling up and understaffed. A little financial relief would go a long way, can you help @danrather? Grateful for your words and amplifying our voice.- community ER doc
As an ER nurse, thank you.
When the first round of this shit show started I kinda thought “yeah, okay, maybe we nurses didn’t plan for this in our careers but we can do this. We’re educated, we’re trained. We got this!!” Now?? I just feel defeated. As though we risked our lives, our sanity, our mental and physical health to help get as many people through this and all those people who called us heroes turned around and stabbed us in the back!! I’m sick and tired of wearing PPE when half the country can’t be bothered to put on a mask much less get vaccinated.
Thank you Dan. Our oldest daughter is an ER Nurse and our youngest is an ICU Nurse. We worry every day for their well being. We spoke with the youngest who is experiencing Covid PTSD. What will happen to her when she can no longer bear the suffering and death of others? She is not alone! Health Care workers every day throughout the nation face unimaginable hours each day as they head off to work. We are all so very sorry! We are a medical family MD, RN's, Medical Assistants. We all thought that these were careers where we could help people. Never in our wildest imagination, did we ever think something like this was possible. How many heroes, like my daughters, get up each day to face death that could have been avoided. I am a 10th generation American. I am a patriot. To see our nation so broken and not a United States when it really counts is tragic. It is very hard to keep the faith, but somehow, we carry on. I appreciate your sharing on steady and other platforms. You are a gift to us all.
From this healthcare worker, thank you.
Beautiful message of thanks and appreciation. I just shared it with my friends as I hold the same sense of sadness and gratitude. Well said, Dan and team.
A thoughtful tribute. It seems we've forgotten about our heroes, the afflicted, and the deaths. News programs used to give information daily (if not aloud, at least there was a window with stats). We forget so easily.
Maybe we should say the same about the many firefighters who have braved this horrible summer out west. Bless the “helpers”!