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Who’s Going to Smile at My Baby? When the Pandemic Comes to the NICU

From the doorway, I watched the mother gently stroke her newborn’s forehead. “I love you,” she whispered. “I’ll be back soon.”

As a resource parent in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) at a large children’s hospital, I am privileged with the task of offering support to families. This was a typical stop in one of many patient rooms. As I gingerly entered the room, the mother glanced up at me, tears welling in her eyes as she scrambled to adjust her mask.

“I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I didn’t want to cry.” A tear rolled down her cheek.

“Not at all,” I replied. “I understand. It’s hard being a mom in the NICU, now more than ever.”

I invited her to share her feelings, hoping to offer some help or comfort. Wiping her cheek with her sleeve, she explained that the pandemic visiting rules had made it difficult to be at her baby’s bedside.

“I have other children, and I need to go home to watch them. The hospital rules say I am the only person allowed to take off their mask in her room, but she needs to see faces for her development. Who is going to smile at my baby when I’m not here?”

Speaking from personal experience.

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2021-02-08T09:43:44-05:00February 8th, 2021|family experience, Nursing, Patients, pediatrics|0 Comments
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The Unsung Heroes of Hospice Are Family Caregivers

Nurses who find their vocation in hospice may be among the most understanding people on earth. As a nurse who has helped many, perhaps hundreds of patients transition into palliative care and hospice, I thought that I would be prepared to handle placing my father into home hospice after a stroke. At 90, my father had vascular dementia due to chronic infarctions. The call from his provider informing me that he had had an embolic stroke with a hemorrhagic component was not completely unexpected. After his anticoagulation was reversed, I knew that he was likely to have another stroke soon.

Walking the tightrope: daughter, nurse, caregiver.

I guess that’s the curse of the nurse. No false hope for me. As the nurse in the family, I walked the tightrope of caregiver, support person, and grieving daughter. The help from the hospice team was extraordinary, but the overall care and responsibility was placed on the family. It was a bit of a shock to me. I can’t imagine how families without members in health care manage.

My father did not pass his swallow test, and he had left-sided paralysis; however, he was initially able to communicate, with some effort. In fact, the priest who saw him on the first day was obviously curious as to […]

2021-01-14T11:15:10-05:00January 14th, 2021|family caregiving, family caregiving, Nursing|2 Comments
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‘What a Decade This Year Has Been’: Nurses Worldwide Double Down on Commitment to Care

The year nobody expected.

A mere dozen months ago, we were all set to celebrate the International Year of the Nurse and Midwife, poised to shine in the global spotlight with the spring release of the first State of the World’s Nursing report. There were plans to fete us with dinners and awards. “Give them ribbons, buttons and badges to wear,” one website suggested.

How quaint and frivolous that sentiment seems now in light of the continuing shortages of the masks, face shields, gowns, and gloves that we need to protect ourselves, our patients, our families and communities from COVID-19

Nurses in the spotlight.

The pandemic changed everything—except for the fact that nurses did land squarely in the spotlight this past year. Nurses—as always—were asked to multitask when the first confirmed cases led to sustained global transmission. We dug in even as we pivoted, attempting to prevent hard-won health gains from being reversed. For example, women still needed prenatal care. Lockdowns didn’t preclude families from requiring essential preventive and lifesaving treatments for countless infectious and chronic diseases—including malaria, HIV, TB, diabetes, and cancer—that suddenly took […]

2020-12-04T10:33:26-05:00December 4th, 2020|COVID-19, Nursing, nursing perspective, nursing roles, Public health|0 Comments
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The Legacy of the Asthma Nurse Who Really Listened to a Five-Year-Old

My mum tells me that when I was two years old, I would regularly go blue, particularly when I was walking my sister to school on a cold, windy day. Alongside this, I coughed incessantly. My parents took me to the doctor’s surgery multiple times, and their concerns were dismissed by the GPs, or a course of antibiotics given.

One day when I was particularly unwell, my mum was unable to get a doctor’s appointment but was able to see one of the practice nurses. The nurse identified intercostal recessions and immediately got a doctor to examine me. The doctor asked my mum how long I had been asthmatic; that was the point at which I finally received the diagnosis that linked me into a nurse-led clinic for long-term monitoring.

The nurse was Mr. Pierce*, a man who initially seemed to me scary, authoritative, and old. His voice boomed and filled his modest consulting room. He always pushed open the door to the patient waiting room with considerable energy and vigor, loudly announcing patient names, a habit which made me jump without fail.

Trusting the patient’s expertise.

Mr. Pierce was very much ahead of his time in terms of acknowledging patients’ expertise in their own health. He listened to my account of symptoms, asking my parents […]

2020-12-02T10:58:37-05:00December 2nd, 2020|Nursing|0 Comments
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Gratitude or Regrets? Contemplating Last Words

“Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory” -Dr. Suess*

Two losses in two days.

by dave shafer/via flickr

Recently, I experienced two unexpected deaths within the span of two days. The first was the passing was of our family’s first dog, who lived with us for 15 years. She was a healthy dog, but suffered from a stroke three days before her death, which disabled her from walking or standing up on her own.

She had symptoms of a suspected brain tumor for months, but she suffered the most during the last three days. Since she was not able to stand up or eat solid food, our family made the difficult decision to relieve our girl from her pain and say goodbye to our dog.

During the same time, my 75-year-old mother, who battled lung cancer for 12 years, went to the emergency department for pain on her right side. Once arriving at the ED, she was prescribed antibiotics to manage her symptoms and then discharged from the hospital. Although she seemed better for a time after returning home, her pain suddenly became unmanageable and she returned to […]

2020-11-20T09:42:51-05:00November 20th, 2020|Nursing|1 Comment
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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