What is it about?
During the COVID-19 pandemic, many nurses experienced difficult working conditions. This paper reports our study of nurses who provided care to COVID patients before May, 2021. Many of these nurses reported extreme stress, exhaustion, and frustration. Our results align with other studies that showed almost 1/3 of nurses who worked during this time are considering leaving nursing.
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Why is it important?
Without nurses, there can be no care for the sickest patients. In 2022, enrollment in entry-level nursing programs dropped for the first time in decades. The results of our study suggest that many nurses are burned out and may leave nursing. More attention must be paid to improving nurses' working conditions in order to maintain the workforce.
Perspectives
As a nurse and an educator in nursing, this work was one of the hardest things I have ever done. Nurses were so deeply traumatized during the pandemic. I am passionate about nursing and nurses, and what we heard here was devastating. I hope that leaders of healthcare organizations, nurse leaders, and nursing educators can learn from these last few years and make sure that we never have these problems again. I also hope we can think ahead and apply trauma-informed strategies to support our workforce and profession.
Candace Burton
University of Nevada Las Vegas
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: A mixed methods study of moral distress among frontline nurses during the COVID-19 pandemic., Psychological Trauma Theory Research Practice and Policy, May 2023, American Psychological Association (APA),
DOI: 10.1037/tra0001493.
You can read the full text:
Resources
Nurses' trauma and the two fronts of the war against COVID-19
As COVID-19 patients are isolated in hospital rooms trying to stay alive, nurses are the ones serving every role, from caretaker to chaplain to stand-in loved one. And when those patients die, nurses take that pain of loss upon themselves. The trauma is heaping up. But it doesn’t have to be this way, says Associate Professor Candace Burton, who is conducting a study about nurses’ experiences during the pandemic by interviewing them. Nurses are confronting both a deadly disease and a culture that refuses to take it seriously. The interdisciplinary study, led by psychological science associate professor Alyson Zalta, is supported by funding from UCI’s Institute for Clinical and Translational Science and is a collaboration with HealthImpact and the American Nurses Association of California (ANA/C). In this episode of the UCI Podcast, Burton shares what nurses are telling her, why reforms in the nursing profession are needed, and how everyone can help prevent more of this trauma.
Candace W. Burton, Ph.D., RN, AFN-BC
Candace W. Burton, Ph.D., RN, AFN-BC, FNAP Director of Doctoral Education (Ph.D. and DNP); Tenured Associate Professor University of Nevada Las Vegas
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