Health workers know what good care is. Pandemic burnout is getting in the way
The desperate and frantic pace of hospital work in 2020 in New York, the epicenter of the U.S. pandemic at the time, was more chaotic than anything intensive care nurse Matthew Crecelius had ever seen. "It was like watching a bomb go off in slow motion," he says.
He was caring for double the usual number of critically ill patients, and navigating hospital halls that looked more like construction zones, with giant fans and plastic tubing blowing a deafening level of extra ventilation. He couldn't hear his patients, or see them through the giant wooden doors of the negative pressure chambers.
"You shout out to somebody, 'Hey, can you check on my other people?,' " he says. " 'I can't even see a monitor; I don't know how they're doing.' "
Once, while Crecelius tended to one COVID-19 patient, another ripped off his oxygen mask, triggering a heart attack. Alarms blared. Crecelius rushed to the room, swathing himself in a new gown, to try to revive the man -- who died clutching a photo of his daughter. As other nurses rushed in to help, other unattended patients started to crash.
Crecelius says he can recall numerous moments like this one, when the crush of work and burnout among health care staff had a direct impact on patient care.
"That plays out again and again, day by day, at many hospitals, and in my opinion, I think it's getting worse,"
