Month: April 2021

COVID-19 began as an unknown form of pneumonia that began in Wuhan, China. We knew that this disease was deadly due to statistics that occurred in China and other countries; however, nobody really knew how this terrible disease was going to impact the United States. It has affected our economy, social lives, livelihood, food systems, agriculture, mental health and most importantly our health care. Individually, the pandemic has hit people in multiple different ways. It is important to acknowledge how it has affected us and how it has helped us learn about ourselves and the future.

            With the onset of the pandemic, I went from living at school being able to hangout with my friends whenever I wanted to living at home with my mom, dad, and sister, unable to see anyone besides them. During that time, I began to self-reflect and realized that I had a responsibility as a future nurse. Although nursing can be portrayed as this glamorous career, there is a daunting side to nursing as well, especially during times like this. Nurses go in to work with uncertainty of how many of their patients could die today. It can be overwhelming thinking of the numbers of lives that could be put into my hands. However, I have realized that it is my job to advocate for these patients and care for them as if they are family with compassion. I did not want to sit around and do nothing; I felt like I had to do something to help the front-line workers. I decided to spend my summer working as a nursing assistant at a local rehab hospital. I really enjoyed being able to be the reason that some of these patients smile. With that being said, it would also break my heart seeing how depressed some of my patients were. Some of them had gone months without seeing their families or even just hugging someone. It became physically and emotionally draining trying to stay positive for my patients. I realized that I needed to focus on myself during my days off to adequately care for my patients. In seeing how many nurses suffered from “burnout” after the spikes in COVID cases, it is evident how important self-care and wellness is in the health care field. This is something that I will take with me throughout my nursing career. The pandemic has taught me what it means to be a nurse to great extents. I am honored to be entering a career that are the superheroes of this pandemic.

As a nursing student, the COVID-19 pandemic has greatly affected my education. Online school became the new reality which is difficult in nursing school as is it a hands-on major. It has brought about new ways to gain clinical experience including virtual simulations and different observation days. This restricted learning opportunities for myself and my peers. Clinical experience is where patient care is taught and where the application of material we learn in lecture is put to the test. Luckily, Maine Medical Center has allowed students back to their facilities this semester and I feel prepared entering my senior year of nursing school. I have learned the basics of patient care and how to use my therapeutic communication when interacting with patients, while also observing medical management of certain diseases. I am not taking any of this clinical exposure for granted and am looking forward to gaining more experience during my senior year.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought about multiple public health debates in which highlight the leadership role of nurses and altered education provided to nursing students. While education for nursing students has focused on providing acute care in hospital settings, it is now evident that health outcomes at a population level should be incorporated. Additionally, an emphasis on how to manage a pandemic should be included in education of both current and future nurses. This should encompass how to manage both patient care and self-care. Nursing schools primarily focus on the role of nurses in a hospital-based environment. The pandemic showed me the variety of settings that nurses could work in. Public health nurses working in communities are needed more than ever right now. For example, a quick adoption of telehealth technology was necessary to serve patients safely. These nurses can care for patients from the comfort of their own home. Professionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has given me a different perspective on a nurses’ scope of practice and the variety of settings that they may work in.

The pandemic has impacted the future wellness needs in our communities. First, and most importantly, mental health counseling will most likely be more accessible to those who need it. Quarantining and the lack of social interaction can increase severity of symptoms of depression and other mental illness. Additionally, after over a year of social distancing from others, overall wellness may be permanently altered. It has revealed that taking care of yourself and taking control of your own health is extremely critical. Post-pandemic wellness will be more focused on the idea of “self” where self-reflection and actualization are key. Health and fitness on a virtual scale has become the new normal and even after restrictions have loosened up, it is still continuing to be popular. Many individuals have adapted new ways to achieve their idea of wellness with new ways of doing things along with new hobbies.

With regards to community health, nurses get the chance to play more of a leadership role. The pandemic taught us that proper sanitation can help decrease the spread of contagious diseases such as COVID-19. I foresee there will be added nurses hired in schools to educate students about proper hand hygiene. Additionally, I think we will need nurses specifically for the COVID-19 vaccinations and information about COVID. This will help to get vaccinations to the public more quickly and provide information to those who have questions about it. Telehealth will become a more common form of medical care. Overall, COVID-19 will provide an increased number of jobs for nurses and give them the recognition that they deserve.

Therapeutic communication is the foundation of any successful interview with an individual suffering with mental illness. With this case, therapeutic communication would help to potentially get down to the root of the client’s issues and figure out why he is feeling the way that he is. During assessment, therapeutic communication helped to gain as much information as possible. The individuals who performed the assessment did a great job with asking open ended questions. Throughout each interview, the student’s responses got more therapeutic over time. Rather than not giving much of a response when a client answered a question, they responded by showing acknowledgement and understanding of what they are going through. This tended to create the trusting patient-nurse relationship. Additionally, frequent follow questions to an unclear response helped to gain a significant amount of information from this client. Throughout the assessment, the students used great therapeutic communication to develop rapport with the patient and to get as much information out of the conversation as possible. Using therapeutic communication as an intervention itself was essential during the interview with Mr. Riley. His main issue is the guilt that he is experiencing around his symptoms of depression. Therapeutic communication is important because it will help to allow the patient to be heard. Specifically, in Mr. Riley’s case, he expressed how he felt a isolated. In that moment, the students acted as support system but justifying the reasons for some of his symptoms and giving recommendations on how to better himself. Having someone actively listen to how the patient is feeling is important in recovery because it allows them to feel heard.

The students in this interview had multiple instances where they used therapeutic communication. Specifically, when Mr. Riley expressed his feelings of guilt, one of the student responded with something along the lines of him not being alone with that guilt and that it is a common symptom of depression. They asked about what could be triggering the guilt and gave him ways to help with it. The students used open ended questions such as, “What would a normal day look like? What do you mean getting back to normal? Tell me more about how it makes you feel.” Multiple times, the students would used interpretations and reflecting statement. This technique was used specifically when the student restated and summarized the patient’s feelings of guilt. She began the restating with, “From what your saying it seems…” Overall, this group did a great job with therapeutic communication throughout their interview and it got better as the interview went on.