I just can’t do this again – NHS in the second wave of covid-19

We had the pleasure of interviewing Dave Carr, a senior critical care nurse at St Thomas’ Hospital in London, yesterday and there is a genuine fear about the impact a second wave will have on the staff of the NHS

Published by TheBoldAge on Sep 23, 2020

We had the pleasure of interviewing David Carr, an experienced critical care nurse from St Thomas’ Hospital in London, for the first episode of our TheBoldAge Podcast (which will be coming out shortly).

While we “thought” we knew what our frontline carers went through during the first wave, it was the stories he told that showed we had no real idea of the stress that our care workers actually experienced. From extended shifts due to illness of staff themselves to sometimes having one intensive care nurse for three patients (normally they only look after one patient). Can you imagine putting yourself in the place of a nurse and having to call a patient’s family and being the person to hold their family member’s hand as the life support is turned off? We can’t.

Coincidentally, The King’s Fund released research this morning (23/09/2020) which is available [here](https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/publications/courage-compassion-supporting-nurses-midwives) that shows the stark impact that the first wave had and what a second wave will have. With over 40,000 vacancies in the NHS there is a clear under-resourcing that is only making their situation worse. It was commissioned by the RCN (Royal College of Nursing) and laid out 8 recommendations:

### Authority, empowerment and influence
Introduce mechanisms for nursing and midwifery staff to shape the cultures and processes of their organisations and influence decisions about how care is structured and delivered.

### Justice and fairness
Nurture and sustain just, fair and psychologically safe cultures and ensure equity, proactive and positive approaches to diversity and universal inclusion.

### Work conditions and working schedules
Introduce minimum standards for facilities and working conditions for nursing and midwifery staff in all health and care organisations.

### Teamworking
Develop and support effective multidisciplinary teamworking for all nursing and midwifery staff across health and care services.

### Culture and leadership
Ensure health and care environments have compassionate leadership and nurturing cultures that enable both care and staff support to be high-quality, continually improving and compassionate.

### Workload
Tackle chronic excessive work demands in nursing and midwifery, which exceed the capacity of nurses and midwives to sustainably lead and deliver safe, high-quality care and which damage their health and wellbeing.

### Management and supervision
Ensure all nursing and midwifery staff have the effective support, professional reflection, mentorship and supervision needed to thrive in their roles.

### Learning, education and development
Ensure the right systems, frameworks and processes are in place for nurses’ and midwives’ learning, education and development throughout their careers. These must also promote fair and equitable outcomes.

Subscribe on our site to be notified when the podcast episode is publishe d.d, the current situation around pay and conditions and the protests that have been ongoing. We also asked Dave about the current rise in cases and it came across very clearly that his team are fearful of this second wave but ready to do their job.

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