At our hospital, management never learned the lessons of the pandemic.
I’m a Pediatrics Charge Nurse, but during the height of the pandemic, I worked as a Nurse Extender — going anywhere and everywhere I was needed to help others handle the avalanche of COVID patients. It wasn’t the work I was trained for, but at that time everything was upside-down. Like frontline healthcare workers across the country, Providence Cedars-Sinai’s Caregivers showed up for any assignment, to work any shift (or multiple shifts) with whatever resources we could muster.
At the end of those relentless days and nights, with our bodies fatigued and our spirits numb, we took whatever precaution we could and prayed that we didn’t bring the virus home. With the meager PPE we were given — gowns like garbage bags, masks reused over and over — that was always a concern. Many of my coworkers got sick.
Working through the chaos, we ran to wherever we were called. Communication was poor. Once, I was asked to draw blood from a COVID patient. I peeled back the sheets to find her arm had been amputated. Too many of us had experiences like that — haunting images that are impossible to leave behind.
Like all facets of society, our hospital was woefully unprepared. In some ways, that was understandable at the time. Management’s feeble attempts to show support wasn’t. Despite the ongoing emergency, they kept busy with work unrelated to patient care. Although many of them had training, they never joined us in the trenches. Instead, they pressured those of us who felt unqualified. “This is a pandemic situation,” they’d say. “This is what Nurses must do.”
If everything that went wrong at the hospital turned into a lesson learned, there could be a silver-lining in the painful experiences that continue to haunt us. Instead, management seems bent on forgetting. When we raise these issues at the bargaining table, it isn’t to complain, it’s to safeguard our future. Management’s only response is to say, “We did what we could with what we had, and we think we did a good job.” By patting themselves on the back and refusing to acknowledge the errors, much less address them in our contract, they risk repeating those errors.
When supplies were short, I stuffed my N-95 into a paper bag with my name written on it, trying not to think about whether it was being properly disinfected. I couldn’t even know if the mask I got back was the one I wore the day before. It was the Wild West of infectious control. There’s no reason that should ever happen again. When the next pandemic comes — and we know it will — we should be able to trust that our PPE supply is sufficient, and that there are protocols in place to keep us safe.
Throughout the pandemic Caregivers have given everything to protect our patients and to keep the hospital running. At the very least, management should listen to us now.
— Rosie Suarez, RN, Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Hospital