Secrets from the Emergency Room: The Untold Cost of Caring | Sandee Mendelson | TEDxAlmansorPark
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- čas přidán 24. 11. 2019
- Sandee Mendelson lifts the veil of silence and offers insight into the unseen realities of nursing. She reveals things that the public will not hear about nursing in the emergency department. Sandee shares an eye-opening account of the real cost of caring while providing an insider’s view of the selfless profession of nursing. Sandee is raising awareness of how our ‘culture of shame’ has created an unspoken epidemic plaguing our frontline care providers. Sandee Mendelson is a Charge Nurse in a Pediatric Emergency Trauma Center who enjoys connecting with others as an Instructor of Nursing Courses, Certified Life Coach, and Inspirational Speaker. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx
Thank you, I needed to hear this. I am inspired by your honesty and ability to spark conversation. As a nurse impacted by vicarious trauma your words speak to me.
I want to apologize for all the things you have had to endure and thank you for the beautiful story you have shared. The beginning story about the 13-month-old who drowned accidentally while being babysat by his sixteen-year-old sister and did not survive even after chest compressions at the start of the video truly broke my heart because I know there will be many situations like this that we will go through as medical providers. You have made such an important about how the traumas nurses see is what can seemingly harden them, and the burnout rates are very high as a result of the constant pressures and tasks they must deal with. The balance for a lot of these different high stress specialties including emergency medicine is difficult to navigate and there are not enough mental health support services/systems in place to aid and prevent burn out. The suicide rates in medicine are a lot higher than most people know and I completely agree that we need to do a better job at taking care of those at the front lines of medicine who help take care of others. The issue is no one really knows the “how”. Especially after the pandemic, staffing has been a nightmare at most hospitals which has also caused a shortage not only on the staffing front but also limited the capacity of how many beds are available for patient’s as well. Ultimately, it still comes down to quality of services I believe. If we can focus on supporting and providing means of help to our nurses by perhaps implementing a mandatory lunch for all nurses and a few smaller breaks throughout the day as well in which a different nurse can then take over during those break times, maybe that could at least alleviate some of the burnout? While I am unsure of the exact means of how we dismantle this vicious cycle of burnout and overload of work in high intensity fields, the first step is to truly see the extent of how much of a problem there is and to speak to those affected to understand what kind of systems need to be put in place. Hospitals have placed many different systems to prevent errors so that we can protect the lives of patients and reduce malpractice cases, we need to do more to help the heart of the hospital which are our nurses.
Thank you so much! I’ve been an ED/trauma nurse for 17 years and experienced tremendous trauma throughout my career. I suffered in silence with severe depression and anxiety. The pandemic’s effect prompted me to get counseling and mental health care services necessary.
Nurse Sandee does such a good job of presenting what a high stress environment the emergency room department can be and how difficult it can be on the morale of all those who try and care in that environment. I am a current 2nd year medical student preparing to enter my first year of clinical work and a former cardiology technician that worked frequently in the emergency room. I can attest to the sounds and stress that excited in an emergency room whether or not they were a trauma center. That is an environment where you cannot predict what will happen next and it is so variable that half the staff believe in superstitions and would never utter the phrase, “it’s been a slow night.”
I think this situation of burnout is a good example of when hospital administration and even family members of patients need to understand the ethical demand that these providers have when caring for patients. I also believe that hospital administration should show them the same care they show their patients. In terms of ethical principles, we talk about non-maleficence being a key pillar in providing proper care for our patients. This means that physicians and nurses have an obligation to inflict no harm to others, on top of that we live by the demands of beneficence which means we go out of our way to care for others. If hospital administration truly lived by these principles, they could impact the degree of burnout experienced by a majority of their staff. This in turn would allow wonderful people like nurse Sandee to work at an increased efficiency when caring for their patients.
Hello Speaker via TEDX Talks,
This talk has inspired me to write a poem called: Empath Nurse 👨🏽⚕️ ❤.
Thank you for what you all have contributed to that 💗,
Aarron Coleman, Certified Nurse Assistant
Phenomenal talk, I feel heard and that even (at least 😉) one of my gifts was accepted. “If you offer to me with *love & devotion* : a leaf 🍁 , a fruit 🍌 , a flower 🌸, or water 💦. I will accept it 😄.” -Downtown Long Beach, California
So true about a nurse and nursing in general
Thank you for speaking so open about mental healthcare struggles. I know this has helped many people who are hurting and struggling. Hopefully one day there will be a shift in nursing culture where mental health can be discussed without embarrassment or shame
What an incredible, inspiring talk on the untold cost of caring for patients in medicine. The mental and moral injury but caring for patients in the emergency room can have on providers, including nurses, is tremendously cloaked and invisible. Having worked in the emergency room for 4-years prior to matriculating into medical school, I have seen first-hand the difficult cases and the way physicians and nurses are needed to push their feels down and away in order to step into the next room and care for another patient. I agree with this speaker that the stigma on mental health is partly the reason so many nurses and providers subdue their emotions for another day, which end up affecting them in the long run. Another reason is there are other patients in need of help. Therefore, is the system set up in a way that we care so much for the patience that we lack the ability to uphold beneficence for ourselves as the provider. Beneficence is an ethical principle that requires us to promote well-being for patients, as medical providers. However, what about the ethical standards we need to uphold for ourselves? How come we ignore beneficence for ourselves and for other providers by continuing to perpetuate this stigma on mental health illness and by not addressing the moral and mental injuries sustained by providers in the field of trauma and emergency medicine. This is a significant opportunity to reform the ethical standards in Madison, and rather than reform them, reform our abilities to uphold them. We have the knowledge, we have the data to demonstrate the issue, now we simply need the solution. I believe there should be a mandatory counseling after nurses, technicians, and providers care for a coding patient in the emergency room and if they were involved in a case where a patient died. On the surface we may seem OK, however working in a field where in death is so near and frequent, there’s inevitably going to be moral injury. If we can begin discussing and working through these difficult situations in a debrief counseling session, I feel this solution can lend towards a more ethical way to manage our emotions as providers and take better care of those taking care of patients.
Great job!
Thankyou 🤲🏽
I'm convinced that 12-hour shifts are unhealthy for all human life involved.
I left the hospital because 12 hour shifts became intolerable.
Imagine you work in an extremely understaffed country, where you often work 36 hour shifts😔
So very sorry to hear of Kristen taking her life; such a great loss. Thank you for sharing this insightful talk. I like your platform idea too.
Who?
@Finechina, watch the video
👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
I have never understood how, especially for ER nurses they work a 12 hour shift in this environment 😢
❤️❤️❤️😭😭😭
I think that it is just not nurses, but physicians and all medical staff experience burnout. It is a huge problem, and starts right from graduate school in my experience. As someone in medical school, I see this happening within my class starting right from the beginning. Schools have resources available, but stating it in an email is different than your peers, mentors, and community around you encouraging you to seek help and decreasing the stigma around mental health. I haven't seen that happen, and those who have seen mental health providers have been ones to take matter into their own hands and advocate for themselves. People are immediately pushed to the edge once school starts and I have continually seen it around me, students afraid to seek help, nervous about looking weak compared to their peers, and admitting defeat once they hear they have to see a mental health counselor. It should not be this way, and taking care of one's mental health should be equally important as taking care of your physical health with exercise and nutrition. If we don't approach the problem right from the beginning, how can we expect it to not happen in the future when everyone is in their careers? By not taking care of ourselves and our healthcare providers, we are endangering the lives of the patients and the providers. Healthcare providers do care and sacrifice a lot for their patients, and we need to find ways to destigmatize mental health, which I think one way is to be open about seeing mental health providers and to lead by example. If a physician, nurse, or healthcare provider is burnt out, it could lead to actions that go against the principle nonmaleficience which is to do no harm. It could lead to anger and resentment which may translate to violations of the ethical principle justice which is to treat others equally and equitably. This problem has probably gotten worse through COVID as mental health and burn out has sky rocketed amongst the Emergency Department. If we want better care, then we also need to take care of our frontline healers. Moral injury is a serious and very prevalent issue, and her talk was powerful, moving, and motivational for change.
اللي يعملون بمهن مرهقه يوصلون مرحلة الزومبي اللي نصير زي الآلات و نشتغل خصوصا لما يكون مشرفك او مشرفتك تكرفك ليل نهار بدون تقدير 🤚🏻 و ما اتكلم عن نفسي .. اتكلم باسم زملائي و زميلاتي كلهم ✊🏻✊🏻
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Our healthcare system sucks. I left nursing after 4 years and never looked back.
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Hi TEDX! Soy un big fan! I CITE a lot of your work in my undergraduate research at UC I. I look forward to this talk!
Aarron Coleman, Active CNA
Post-Acute Care Nursing Salutatorian: Life-Ed 4 Nurses, West Covina, CA 🩷🤍🩵❤️🩹⛱️
*Moral Injury is Super REAL* 🫰🏽