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Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

nytimes.com

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Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#71

Post by lotsofpulp »

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #41
lotsofpulp wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s just reality. If you want more people to sign up to change bedpans during a pandemic, then pay up. The cause of stress among healthcare providers is economic, and so is the solution. I would never advise my kids to go into a job where a part of your pay is being called a hero. That’s how you get taken advantage of. This is not wartime. This is a result of MBAs in management running the organization so lean that…

The labor force isn't a frictionless system. If we decided to double nurse's pay worldwide right now, how long do you think it would take until we have more nurses?

I’m sure it takes years for a nurse to learn the ins and outs of the job, but my point is if they were paid well historically, then more people would have become nurses. And perhaps less trained people like CNA’s can be trained in a few months to start assisting nurses? But it has to begin with incentivizing them with proper pay.

Relying on people’s charity to do their duty in lieu of competitive pay is not a good strategy.

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#72

Post by [deleted] »

zaroth wrote: post #44
chowells wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care how much someone other than me makes. I care that you're so insensitive that when you're told that medical professionals are burning out en mass you think money makes up for it. That's so incredibly lacking in both empathy (they're human beings) and utility (they're medical care providers) that I can't reconcile it with any good-faith viewpoint on the world. So I have to assume it's trolling and should n…

Some jobs are hard and extremely strenuous. The least we can do is pay very well for them and make sure that anyone doing the job is well informed of the risks, is a consenting adult, is making the choice freely and not under coercion like threat of being fired. Very good pay is absolutely an “upside”. The personal and emotional attacks against OP are totally unwarranted.

[deleted]

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#73

Post by i_haz_rabies »

alistairSH wrote: post #60
woahAcademia wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it's sad people feel pains. I'm also unhappy that those same people have used Regulatory capture to increase their wages at the expense of public health. Deregulate medical and there will be less burnout, but the pay will be cut in half.

There are far more nurses and other health care workers who don't make mega-money than there are MDs making millions.

There are way more MDs making much less than you'd think. Some specializations especially are also feeling the pain of tech disruption, like optometry (most optometry offices rely on glasses and contact sales, which are drying up thanks to online stores) or radiology (thanks to ML image processing).

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#74

Post by meragrin_ »

jfim wrote: post #16
Der_Einzige wrote: post #2

On the upside, traveling nurses are now routinely making 5-10K a week (and they usually get real PPE rather than be told to reuse stuff) That's far better money than most soldiers (or even FAANG engineers) make, and the risk of being shot or having to write crappy unit tests is far smaller. Source if you don't believe me: https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/24/health/covid-nurses-big-money... Lmao what's wrong downvoters? Do…

> are now routinely making 5-10K a week [...] That's far better money than most soldiers (or even FAANG engineers) make That's not an unusual amount of money to make at L5 after a few years, and unlike the traveling nurse position, it's not temporary. That being said, I'm glad to see hospitals competing on actual worker safety, hopefully this will encourage hospitals to have sustainable stocks of PPE in the future.

L5?

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#75

Post by bigbubba »

nishantk wrote: post #70
bigbubba wrote: post #55

If their industry didn't artificially restrict the supply of labor to keep their wages sky high, they wouldn't be so overworked now that more is required of them. My sympathy is nonexistent; they've made out like bandits for years and now they're paying the price for that (unfortunately, that's a price that must be paid by the rest of us too.) I hope they begin to take this as a wakeup call. To the downvoters, let me…

you're blaming ground-level individual doctors and nurses for administrative and systematic industry failures. In a heavily regulated and specialized industry where mobility is more limited.

Doctor run hospitals aren't any cheaper. Collectively, doctors control the regulation and administration of their own industry. The AMA is one of the largest lobbyists in America. They have incredible political influence.

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#76

Post by falcolas »

bserge wrote: post #59
6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you imagine seeing headlines about people dying because of people like you walking out during a crisis? And knowing you contributed to those deaths? And where are you going to go? Switch industries in the middle of this? Because if you stay in healthcare, walking out of your single facility doesn't even get you away from the pandemic. I have friends burning out in healthcare, being paid terribly, but sticking i…

They can just quit. But not because they're bad people. When you're really burned out, you don't give half a fuck about anything. It can be the choice between staying and jumping off a bridge one night, or just leaving. I hope not many people experience that kind of stress, but if you do, just walk out. It's always an option.

> just walk out. It's always an option.

Not everybody has the same job mobility people on this site do. Walking out could very well result in homelessness for many RNs.

Freedom isn't very free when your other choice is to lose the basics you need for survival.

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#77

Post by bluedino »

u801e wrote: post #47
bluedino wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hospital I work for will pay me time and a half to come in after hours and do anything that needs done (moving patients, feeding patients, cleaning rooms), and I'm in IT. They are desperate.

> The hospital I work for will pay me time and a half to come in after hours and do anything that needs done (moving patients, feeding patients, cleaning rooms), and I'm in IT. I think it's more along the lines that it's probably cheaper to pay you time and a half given hospital IT pay compared to paying qualified nursing staff to do the same.

I'm not qualified to do anything 'medical', this is all stuff they would have CNA's do for as cheap as possible.

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#78

Post by appleseed538 »

woahAcademia wrote: post #26
Red_Leaves_Flyy wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dedication to, empathy for the humans that would otherwise die is the more likely conclusion. Most people aren't solely motivated by greed. Many nurses have actually had their pay cut during this pandemic and have kept slaving away in garbage bags and cloth masks despite their wholesale mistreatment.

Yeah it's sad people feel pains. I'm also unhappy that those same people have used Regulatory capture to increase their wages at the expense of public health. Deregulate medical and there will be less burnout, but the pay will be cut in half.

[dead]

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#79

Post by pb7 »

acdha wrote: post #27
UShouldBWorking wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He said, "on the upside". In no way did he detract from the work they are doing. I also don't get the downvoted.

It’s not a useful contribution: overwork is always a problem and especially important in healthcare where it’s not “our project launches late” but “someone died due to error or lack of attention”. It’s also misrepresenting the few who can travel with the much larger group who can’t take those gigs - especially important when you consider what life is like for anyone with kids right now. Put in HN terms, do your 80 ho…

Nurses get paid hourly in most(?) places including generous overtime. Most professions get frequently overworked with little extra for that increase. Do you feel just as bad publicly for those folks as you do for nurses?

Re: Doctors and Nurses Are Running on Empty

#80

Post by troughway »

n0us wrote: post #42

Man, this thread really bringing out the worst of Hackernews and its so disappointing but unfortunately not surprising to see the complete lack of capacity for empathy from some of the other heavily downvoted commenters. Almost everyone who participates on this site is well educated and fortunate enough to understand that people have been putting their lives on the line for months on end to help people through this c…

>Man, this thread really bringing out the worst of Hackernews and its so disappointing but unfortunately not surprising to see the complete lack of capacity for empathy from some of the other heavily downvoted commenters.

Now you know.

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