Nurses asked to retrain (Michael Montgomery)
Fact Check:
"The hospital said that by not accepting deployment, it was another way of saying that I was resigning"
There are many hospitals that are implementing these rules. A recent CNN article "Emergency room nursing staff at a Detroit hospital were told to leave Sunday night after they refused to work"(Paul P. Murphy, Ryan Young and Jake Carpenter). These strict guidelines puts a pressure on nurses who believe that working with these patients can cause severe harm to their families but yet need the job.
"There were a few people who did quit"
Hospitals are having problems where there are not enough nurses to sufficiently care for COVID-19 patients. A recent CNN article shows that after giving the ultimatum, "Emergency room nursing staff at a Detroit hospital were told to leave Sunday night" (Paul P. Murphy, Ryan Young and Jake Carpenter).
"I’ve had only pulled one all-nighter since my early nursing days which made these days especially difficult."
There are studies that show that detering from a schedule can cause much stress. This coupled with the massive amount of patients and work that nurses have to go through at a time can cause much more stress that what they are used to. “Workload, leadership/management style, professional conflict and emotional cost of caring have been the main sources of distress for nurses for many years”(Rachel Lewis, Joanna Yarker, Emma Donaldson-Feilder, Paul Flaxman and Fehmidah Munir).
"It was only a 4-hour refresher course including BLS"
https://gyazo.com/aeef97e2f85687b07fca2cdce3d924c3
This is important because having such a small time for learning can make nurses feel uncomfortable with working with patients. There needs to be a sense of confidence so that all people feel comfortable during the situation and help lighten up the stress during these times.
"rely on and trust other nurses for modern procedures and electronic medical record data entry"
Rachel Montgomery, a recent nurse graduate, has been helping Wendy with the modernization of patient care data records. This is especially important for the nurses so that there is no wrong data of missing data placed that may potentially harm the patient or the nurse. "I spent nights with her [Wendy], and quizzed on procedures that she may have to go through"(R. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 12, 2020).
Analytic Essay
Retrained COVID-19 Nurse: Current non-essential Nurses Perspective on COVID-19
Covid-19 is an extremely infectious disease that millions of people have caught in the past months across the world. There are multiple strains of the virus and the harshest of them can cause hospitalization. There has been a significant increase in hospitalized patients in the past few months. These patients require intensive care as they suffer from many deadly symptoms such as difficulty breathing. With such an influx of victims, there is a call for medical staff across the world. There is a need for nurses and doctors for not only the COVID-19 patients but also other emergency patients. In many hospitals around the world, there have been reassignments of non-emergent nurses and doctors to aid emergency COVID-19 patients.Many programs were already in place for online learning. These are especially helpful when you want to keep a safe distance from everyone. One of the most training websites is Oxford Medical Simulation. This is a way for students to obtain clinical experience through simulated cases. There are many set-ups to aid in getting the best experience such as virtual reality programs that help these "Doctors and nurses around the world are working in unbelievably challenging situations, often treating patients in areas outside their fields of expertise. Though this is entirely necessary for such an extreme situation, many are concerned about their skills and experience in these areas. It is, therefore, the least we can do to help them improve their confidence and competence in caring for their patients. "(Dr. Jack Pottle).
All of this sounds like a great plan, but it is not put into practice as much as they want you to think. Wendy Montgomery is a bariatric nurse, a non-essential nurse, who was called to work with COVID-19 patients. When learning about recruiting, it was a lot of rumors and a lot of anticipating. After questions such as if they have experience working in ICU and whether they are fit working for COVID-19 patients, nurses such as herself were drafted into the front lines. “The hospital said that by not accepting deployment, it was another way of saying that I was resigning” (W. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 10, 2020). “There were a few people who did quit”(W. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 10, 2020).
Wendy had no problem with the idea of working with the patients and she wants to help people recover. She knows patient care but just feels lost because she had not done any ICU work since 2008. The only “training” that she received was a refresher on chest tubes and other COVID-19 related procedures. “It was only a 4-hour refresher course including BLS.” She had to "rely on and trust other nurses for modern procedures and electronic medical record data entry"(W. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 10, 2020). When working on a non-stop routine, it is difficult to get help from other people due to the severity of COVID-19 patients.
The icing on the cake was the hours she was forced to work. She was put on the night shift from 7 pm-7 am. She would leave at 6:30 PM after a quick meal does not punch out until 7:30 am usually. There would be three of these shifts per week. Switching back and forth from this schedule and a normal one was very difficult. “I’ve had only pulled one all-nighter since my early nursing days which made these days especially difficult.” This is very detrimental to peoples’ mental well-being. The “Workload, leadership/management style, professional conflict and emotional cost of caring have been the main sources of distress for nurses for many years”(Rachel Lewis, Joanna Yarker, Emma Donaldson-Feilder, Paul Flaxman and Fehmidah Munir).
Other people face different challenges than her. She had expressed concern for co-workers who had health problems and should not be dealing with COVID-19 patients. Some people did not handle the emergency very well. Wendy mentioned witnessing conflicts between other hospital workers. Everyone was hoping for safe social practicing and reduced patient numbers.
Wendy offers a perspective on how the change of lifestyle heavily affects nurses. There is an unbelievable amount of stress and change placed on nurses. There are high expectations placed on them with inadequate training and aid. Nurses are not given as much aid as news sources make out.
References:
Rachel Lewis, Joanna Yarker, Emma Donaldson-Feilder, Paul Flaxman, Fehmidah Munir, Using a competency-based approach to identify the management behaviours required to manage workplace stress in nursing: A critical incident study, International Journal of Nursing Studies, 10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2009.07.004, 47, 3, (307-313), (2010).(R. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 12, 2020).
(W. Montgomery, Personal Communication, April 10, 2020).
Murphy, P. P., & Young, R. (2020, April 8). Detroit hospital nurses refuse to work without more help, ordered to leave. Retrieved April 28, 2020, CNN. Retrieved from https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/07/us/detroit-nurses-sinai-grace-coronavirus/index.html
17,000 doctors and nurses training during COVID-19 using virtual simulation technology. (2020, March 31). M2 Presswire, p. NA. Retrieved from https://link-gale-com-proxy2-cl-msu-edu.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/apps/doc/A619021022/ITOF?u=msu_main&sid=ITOF&xid=045905e5