An essay by nurse practitioner Lauren Ghazal on CNN.com is reverberating across social media. In her incisive and personal opinion piece, Ghazal warns that “Our nursing workforce will keep crumbling if changes aren’t made.”
As a nurse practitioner and researcher, the Regis grad (BSN ’15, MSN ’16) writes, “Being on the front lines of waves of infections has carried an extreme physical and emotional burden that’s leading to immense burnout.” She laments “the hopelessness that comes from seeing no end in sight and meeting people who won’t face the truth,” describing “this rejection of reality” as a “betrayal… while some of the public may choose to be ‘done’ with the pandemic, or live as though it doesn’t exist, for healthcare workers like myself there has been no escape.”
Ghazal calls for financial support for nursing schools, which face faculty shortages, and for “more leaders, inside and outside the nursing field.”
