Who is your nurse?

Chances are, you know a nurse.

Your sister. Your neighbor. Your nephew. Your partner. Your grandmother. Your friend.

Your nurse.

Today marks the start of National Nurses Week, which culminates on National Nurses Day on May 12 — the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing. The legacy forged by pioneers in the nursing profession lives on in over 4 million nurses in the United States.

Utah boasts at least 38,000 registered nurses, the largest occupation in the state’s health care workforce. For 21 years in a row, Americans have voted nursing to be the most trusted and ethical profession. Unfortunately, these votes of confidence do not equate to nurses staying in the field, nor do they protect nurses from workplace violence, burnout or unsafe staffing ratios.

Nurses are overworked, underpaid, exhausted and underappreciated. The COVID-19 pandemic magnified glaring weaknesses in our health care system, and the weight of this vulnerability landed on the backs of those who practice at the bedside. The mass exodus of new and experienced nurses from the practice since 2020 will reverberate through the health care industry for years to come. State and industry leaders scrambled to increase funding for educating new nurses, sought alternative licensure options and attempted to streamline nursing education pipelines. With thousands of new nurses entering the field annually in the state of Utah, we are still experiencing a crippling nursing shortage. This begs the question, why are our nurses leaving the profession?

Any nurse will tell you that the first step in treating a hemorrhage is not to infuse blood but to staunch the bleeding. Yes, we need more nurses. But nurses are not disposable. The industry must treat nurses as if they were indispensable so they don’t burn out in a year or two before leaving the profession altogether. Retention and sustainability efforts should be the priority. Nurses must have the support and the resources they need to practice safely and effectively. Until that happens, nurses will continue to leave, and we will continue to infuse nurses into a system that is hemorrhaging.

I’m writing this article on my way home from back-to-back nursing conferences. After spending time with innovative, compassionate and brilliant nurses, I am humbled, empowered and inspired. There’s something amazing about a force of nurses who put their whole souls into helping, healing and lifting others amid a crushing nationwide nursing shortage in a post-pandemic world.

Does your nurse know they are valued?

Do they know that you appreciate them —

Their tendency to put the comfort of others before their own?

Their care for the vulnerable?

Their talent to combine science with compassion?

Their willingness to see the unseen?

Their willingness to see you?

I hope we can express appreciation to the nurses in our lives. Let them know that they are valued, needed, essential.

Who is your nurse?

Carrie Jeffrey, Ph.D.(r), RN, is an assistant professor of nursing at Weber State’s Annie Taylor Dee School of Nursing, which is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year. She teaches in undergraduate and graduate nursing programs and has recently stepped into the director role for the Doctor of Nursing Practice program.

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