Hospital Greed Is Destroying Our Nurses. Here’s Why. | NYT Opinion
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- Опубликовано: 19 янв 2022
- We’re entering our third year of Covid, and America’s nurses - who we celebrated as heroes during the early days of lockdown - are now leaving the bedside. The pandemic arrived with many people having great hope for reform on many fronts, including the nursing industry, but much of that optimism seems to have faded.
In the Opinion Video above, nurses set the record straight about the root cause of the nursing crisis: chronic understaffing by profit-driven hospitals that predates the pandemic. “I could no longer work in critical care under the conditions I was being forced to work under with poor staffing,” explains one nurse, “and that’s when I left.” They also tear down the common misconception that there’s a shortage of nurses. In fact, there are more qualified nurses today in America than ever before.
To keep patients safe and protect our health care workers, lawmakers could regulate nurse-patient ratios, which California put in place in 2004, with positive results. Similar legislation was proposed and defeated in Massachusetts several years ago (with help from a $25 million “no” campaign funded by the hospital lobby), but it is currently on the table in Illinois and Pennsylvania. These laws could save patient lives and create a more just work environment for a vulnerable generation of nurses, the ones we pledged to honor and protect at the start of the pandemic.
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Hi, I'm Lucy, a producer with Opinion Video. When I first started hearing about a nursing shortage, I thought that I understood why that was happening: Burned-out nurses were finally succumbing to exhaustion after a two-year battle with the virus. But after reaching out to over 50 nurses I learned I was wrong. In reality Covid had just exacerbated a problem that existed long before the pandemic. in our video, five of the nurses I spoke with explain in their own words how corporate greed has created a critical shortage of bedside nurses, and what can be done to solve this crisis. I'd love to know what you thought of our film, and answer questions about how we reported and produced it. Leave your comments below
Nurse here ✋🏽I love my job. But if you think hospitals are bad, wait til you hear about Skilled Nursing Facilities (nursing homes). The working conditions are incredibly unsafe for everyone.
" there's not a shortage of nurses there's just a shortage of nurses willing to work under those conditions." Well stated.
Became a nurse in 2016. My wife and daughter are nurses. The amount of corruption, waste, incompetence and greed is astounding. I and my wife are looking for different fields away from nursing.
Very informative. When they mentioned the 25 million dollars spent in one state to defeat a ballot measure that would've created a staff/patient ratio law, I couldn't help but to think "I wonder how many nurses salaries could be paid with that 25 million..."
I have been a nurse for 15 years and left the bedside because the staffing levels were incomprehensible. Expected to care for 9-10 patients on an acute care floor. You feel like you can’t give the care that patients deserve and it takes a huge toll on your mental health. It’s also not safe at all.
The worst part is, even if severely understaffed, the nurse is still liable for any and all incidents.
Very informative thanks for sharing. I quit my job as an RN last two years ago after almost 17 years in the field. It was not an easy decision, but life is too short to dread going to work everyday. No amount of money can buy real happiness, but friends I'm not asking you to resign from your job or abandon your business but be wise!
The nurse talking about the patient soiled in urine. I can’t tell you how many car rides home I’ve cried because of this. Something so simple as helping someone to the bathroom and I just couldn’t do it because I was too busy. It breaks you down after awhile and makes you feel like a bad person.
OMG this is the first video I’ve seen that FINALLY summarizes how I’ve been feeling as a frontline nurse!!!!! Everything else I have seen posted on social media or by media outlets does exactly that - blames the pandemic as being the sole reason for exhausting the nurses. NOT TRUE! We signed up for patient care, and by this point in the pandemic, we should be able to do this! What we DID NOT sign up for are dangerous patient ratios and limited medical supplies all because of corporate greed! Thank you for finally shining a light on this!
“To maximize profit, hospitals….” That right there is the problem.
I will never forget during my orientation at my first nursing job out of school the administrator said “nurses are our biggest expense”. Hospitals look at nurses as an “expense” that’s what we are to them. What is a hospital without its nurses? I would like to see them go a day with no nurses… an hour… how about just 15 minutes with no nurses.
I think it’s honestly nuts that nurses and doctors work 12+ hour shifts. How is that safe for anyone?
Every time you hear about a worker shortage (be it fast food, nurses, teachers, IT, etc.) know that there really isn't a shortage. It's always due to horrible working conditions.
This is both heartbreaking and disturbing. I had no idea things were this bad. Much love to these health care professionals. They are awesome.
I am a nursing student. No one in my cohort wants to become a bedside nurse and if they do, they only want to do it for 2 years max. We all want to specialize and leave the bedside as soon as possible. It’s crazy how no one wants to do bedside anymore due to the abuse that nurses face. It’s really saddens me because patients need our help. But I have to take care of my mental and physical well being first before I can help others.
I've been only a nurse for 14 years and I want to quit today. This is the only job that i went home with a shiner and concussion and was told by the manager that it's just part of our job. In the hospital, i was taking care of 6-8 patients. In the nursing home, I'm responsible for 30-40 patients.
Being a nurse, knowing this is so true. America Healthcare System sucks. I’ve even change my career direction because I am tired. Prayers for all my nurse colleagues 🤍
“Servant Servant, get me some coffee” one patients kept yelling at me & then I even got spat on 🤦🏽♀️
One of the things that i struggled the most in the first years as a social worker was the open acknowledgement and acceptance of burying us with a high caseload. Like it was so normalized and joked about. Like social workers can do great work in the lives of the people we touch but the amount of work that we are given makes us practically useless.