Let’s go through this again...

Many hospitals and ICUs across the country are full. Don’t believe me? Look through my timeline or that of any legit healthcare professional. I’ve RT stories from across the country. We are getting phone calls to transfer patients from several

states over/away. It’s not just near me. This is happening across the country.

What does that mean?

It means that hospitals are so full that they will be closing to ECMO, Stroke, Trauma. They will be closing down for elective spine, orthopedic, and cancer surgeries. So, when

patients come in needing heart-lung bypass or want their suspicious looking pancreatic mass removed, their painful spinal condition fixed, or their hip replaced after waiting years to get it done... they will likely have to wait. Waiting will worsen outcomes.

It means

that routine conditions like trauma and bowel obstructions will be harder if not impossible to treat due to lack of available staff.

Notice that I did not say “beds”. We are facing a nationwide bed shortage, but lay-people don’t understand that terminology. When we say we

don’t have beds, what we mean is that we may have a stretcher but that is worthless without housekeepers, physical therapists, nurses, nursing aids, doctors, etc to make sure the room and the patient are taken care of properly. If you think that hospitals are just empty

rooms like a hotel, then I would suggest you try being critically ill in a hotel and see how that goes.

We haven’t even hit thanksgiving yet. And hospitals are already full. Thanksgiving appears to be on track to be a nationwide super spreader event. Because people aren’t

listening. So while hospitals are full now, they are about to exceed capacity. Because all the COVID that gets spread over thanksgiving will likely result in increasing cases and hospitalizations right before Christmas.

There is no end in sight. And that is just the short

term issue.

In the long term, you are taking an entire profession worth of healthcare workers who are already distraught and experiencing PTSD... and adding more work, less sleep, and more despondency. Why? Because there are nurses and doctors who are so

far past burnt out that they want to leave medicine. ALREADY. They need to leave. They need some self care. But they won’t.

Why? Because they know that if they call out or no show at work, a colleague, friend, and fellow survivor will have to pick

up their patients and their workload for the day. And they simply will not do that to their fellow nurses or doctors.

Because that is who we are.

It is the same trait that has allowed healthcare administrators and insurance companies to abuse healthcare

professionals for decades. They take advantage of our altruism. But now, instead of that abuse coming from one direction, it’s coming from all sides. It’s coming from an entitled, ignorant, and disrespectful public as well. It’s coming from politicians who have a vested interest

in undermining medical professionals who are screaming for help and in doing so exposing problems they don’t want you to hear about.

And that is, as they say, the straw that broke the camels back.

So, what we are now seeing and what we will see for months and likely years to

come, is a mass exodus from the bedside.

Next year, or three years, or ten years from now... when you or your loved ones end up in the ICU or need spine surgery or want your hip replaced, the chances are getting higher and higher that you will have a brand new surgeon or nurse

or tech. They will be well-trained, intelligent, and hard working. They will pour their hearts into giving you and your family the very best they can. But there is no substitute for a nurse or doc who has been in the ICU for 20 years. Who has seen it all and can do it all. Who

recognizes when a patient is getting sicker in front of their eyes and has an idea about how to fix it.

Suffice it to say, this post will be called fear mongering. These are not my fears. These are predictions that many experts are making based on current FACTS. These are

not my feelings. These are extrapolations of trends we are already seeing.

We are tired of screaming out to a nation that has disregarded science and it’s healthcare workers. We have no incentive to say these things. Not one of us gets paid to share facts or concerns on Twitter

We are not paid by the media or the deep state. We get nothing but grief out of writing these posts. We receive hateful and disingenuous comments from trolls. As if we have the time or energy for that right now. And I’m not alone. None of us has the bandwidth to address the

trolls or the hatred. So please, don’t waste your energy. We are not going to respond. We are going to speak our truth and then when folks say hateful things, we
will block, move on, and go back to caring for our patients the very best we can.

Because that’s who we are. It’s

who we have always been.

And if, god forbid, you get sick during this surge after trolling and harassing healthcare workers online and denying the pandemic as a “hoax”, you will still receive the very best healthcare that we are able to provide.

Because that is who we are.

We are just a bunch of folks who genuinely care for others. We are trying to help you. We are trying to keep you from getting sick. But you have to open your minds and your hearts and help yourselves too. We cannot do this alone.

Please

For all the folks who would like to see this thread unrolled https://twitter.com/threadreaderapp/status/1330747363426701312