My institution just went through a five day nursing strike. It was a doozy, and I was so happy to see some of my favorite nurses back on the floor yesterday! But the strike opened my eyes up to how poorly doctors advocate for ourselves. If you saw my story on day 1, I put all my feelings out there about this topic, and learned a lot from your responses. You’ll probably see more about that soon. . One thing that really rankled me was the fact that tasks were offloaded on physicians and especially residents during the strike. We were expected to come in two hours early on the first and last day to round on our patients during the transitions between strike and Union nurses. Residents on consult blocks volunteered to help walk the halls in case of disaster- and were paid with nothing but admiration and thanks. We were told to go around multiple times a day to make sure orders were being carried out. All this for no additional compensation. My IM program is wonderful and so the program bought us all breakfast on those days, but so far, all the hospital admin has offered us is a free lunch (ironically, on the day that we get “good” lunch from our program.) . To make matters worse, one of my colleagues anonymously aired their grievances on a social media platform- only to be reprimanded by hospital admin for being “inaccurate” in their expression of their opinion. Even though that person was providing free labor!!! There was no compassion for them, not recognition for the additional burden they were taking on. . For me and pretty much all of my colleagues, patient care comes first. But it feels like this hurts us as a profession. I didn’t think twice about waking up early to make sure my patients didn’t fall through the cracks. But I also know that I wouldn’t have accepted this from the job I had in college- so why am I accepting it now? . #procreate #illustration #webcomic #healthcare #resident #intern #inpatient #doctor #relatable #womeninmedicine #blackdoctors #graphicmedicine #premed #premedmotivation #residency #internalmedicine #medschool #medicine #medicalschool #medlife #md #medstudent #nurse
I.M. Resident only a little jaded.