Deconstructing the NYT Article and My Thoughts on the “Nursing Shortage” Bonus Episode

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Who You’ll Hear

Kati Kleber, MSN RN – Nurse educator, former cardiac med-surg/stepdown and neurocritical care nurse, author, and speaker.

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Citations
- New York Times Article – ‘Nursing Is in Crisis’: Staff Shortages Put Patients At Risk
- Why American ran out of protective masks – and what we can do about it
- How decades of offshoring left to mask shortage in a pandemic
  - *Correction: I stated that 80% of masks were produced in China. However, I quoted an outdated figure. Approximately 70-90% of masks are made overseas, while approximately 50% came specifically from China.
- Public health system CEO earnings breakdown
- The Morality of Refusing to Treat HIV-positive Patient – Journal of Applied Philosophy
Key quotes:
- “There is no sound libertarian argument entitling doctors and nurses to refuse to treat HIV-positive patients.”
- “A morally appropriate identification with his or her role would disincline a health care professional to refuse treatment to an HIV-positive patient.”
- “The likely source of such refusal is occupational alienation and an irrational reaction to AIDS symbolism.”

Help with compassion fatigue
- Finding a counselor – Psychology Today’s “Find a Therapist Tool”
- Myself a professional counselor created a free online course for nurses experiencingmental and emotional stress with downloads, tips, journal prompting, and more. If you’re not sure if you need o actually see a counselor or not, we talk about that in the course – Coping Through COVID
- Check out your hospital’s “EAP” resources. EAP means employee assistance program, which often offers free anonymous counseling services to employees. This could be on your hospital’s intranet page, or just ask your manager. Because this is often an included benefit in your compensation package, you or your manager aren’t going to be charged for each session or anything like that. Hospitals contract with counseling agencies to provide this service, so there isn’t communication between your counselor and your manager, other than confirmation of your employment status.
Help with knowing your worth and negotiation
- Use these resources to see if you’re underpaid. You can see what low, median, and top performers in your area are earning to see where you stack up, and use these data points to help guide negotiations for raises.
- The No-Stress Guide to Negotiating Your Salary
- Crafting Your Dream Career

The No-Stress Guide to Negotiating Your Salary – A negotiation course I really like is from Ramit Sethi. While it’s not geared towards nurses, his techniques are highly applicable.
Crafting Your Dream Career from Kelsey Rowell at Whole Life Nurse. Enrollment is closed, but if you get on the waitlist, sometimes spots open before the next open enrollment period, and you can be automatically filled in when they do.
Coping Through COVID