How’s Your N95 Supply These Days?
Since the pandemic began to wreak havoc in the U.S., my first question to bedside nurses has been, “Do you have enough PPE?” To my amazement, even as hospital admissions surged, many nurses told me that yes, they had a good supply of N95s. I quickly learned to be more specific: “How often do you receive a new N95?” Sometimes, the answer was “every shift.” More often, nurses told me “every week,” sometimes adding, “but I cover it with a new surgical mask every day.”
Redefining the PPE norm.
And so, barely a month into the pandemic, nurses had quickly adapted to a new normal. These days, it seems that N95 supplies are “good” when we have any at all. Certainly, nurses continue to protest our lack of PPE. But how did we arrive at this place where we are glad to have any protection at all?
“The lack of essential personal protective equipment (PPE) has been a defining characteristic of the coronavirus pandemic. From the beginning, respiratory protection guidance was driven by shortages of N95 respirators and surgical masks rather than by the well-established standards of infection prevention and control.”
In this month’s AJN Reports, we look at why PPE supplies are still suboptimal […]