100 signatures reached
To: Alex Azar, Head of Health and Human Services
Our Healthcare Workers are being Traumatized
Require hospitals across the country to use the Hospital Incident Command System to provide Stress Inoculation Training and Stress Debriefing to first responders and everyone working in the hospital setting.
Why is this important?
First Responders, Physicians, Nurses and all support staff are being exposed to psychological trauma as they respond to patients with Covid-19. Every day they face multiple traumatizing experiences: inadequate medical supplies making it impossible to render the care they were trained to deliver, personal physical danger, relentless hours, separation from their families and in some cases having to make desperate moral choices about which patient receives treatment.
They have not been prepared for this onslaught, level of exhaustion and depletion. The authorities have not seen fit to provide training on handling extreme stress nor have the authorities seen fit to offer stress debriefing which has been shown to lessen the damaging effects of trauma.
Our first responders and healthcare workers are suffering psychological and moral wounding as they try to save us. Past studies after SARS demonstrate that a significant percentage of them will develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result. This will likely be debilitating for many of them, their families and will impact our entire healthcare system.
We can do better. We can back up the people who are putting their well-being on the line for us by demanding they be provided with well researched on-site training and support.
Tell Alex Azar to stop taking advantage of our sisters and brothers who are trying to take care of the desperately ill. Tell Alex Azar to use his authority to demand they be supported and cared for right now.
They have not been prepared for this onslaught, level of exhaustion and depletion. The authorities have not seen fit to provide training on handling extreme stress nor have the authorities seen fit to offer stress debriefing which has been shown to lessen the damaging effects of trauma.
Our first responders and healthcare workers are suffering psychological and moral wounding as they try to save us. Past studies after SARS demonstrate that a significant percentage of them will develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result. This will likely be debilitating for many of them, their families and will impact our entire healthcare system.
We can do better. We can back up the people who are putting their well-being on the line for us by demanding they be provided with well researched on-site training and support.
Tell Alex Azar to stop taking advantage of our sisters and brothers who are trying to take care of the desperately ill. Tell Alex Azar to use his authority to demand they be supported and cared for right now.