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Inside the halls of American hospitals, millions of people find comfort, healing, and support. But for many doctors and nurses, this couldn’t be further from the truth. This podcast will dive into the shadows of American healthcare to investigate and uncover the abuse, control, and political power plays that leave the very people responsible for our nation’s health, broken and battered. We’re sharing stories of professionals in medicine that have experienced horrendous treatment at the hands of a broken system that does nothing to stop the trauma. As the Association of American Medical Colleges states, “Long before the #MeToo movement, women in medicine have instinctively banded together to counter a culture that too often tolerated harassment.” From systemic trauma to abuse of power to the unspoken rules of cover-ups and corruption, Mandy Irby and HeHe will take you to the darkest corners of healthcare in America so you can have an inside look at bringing humanity back to medicine!
Episodes
Friday May 13, 2022
Friday May 13, 2022
National Nurses March will be marching in Washington D.C. in a an effort to promote change nationally for nurses for the following: Fair wages, Safe Staffing Nurse Patient Ratios, and no violence or discrimination against healthcare workers.
Friday May 06, 2022
Friday May 06, 2022
Friday Apr 29, 2022
Friday Apr 29, 2022
This episode is a discussion on the evolving language in medicine and the heavy lifting that is required by consumers of medical care just to understand what everyone is talking about! We’ve noticed a difference in language spoken between colleagues vs spoken to patients and differences in the outpatient setting, in-patient setting, and even social media.
HeHe and Mandy sit down with Dr. Chrissy Sheeler, family practice physician in Canada, to share an interesting conversation we had in IG DMs that we wanted to continue - so we hit record! You get to listen in on this conversation, and Dr. Sheeler drops some awesome changes in language that you can start making to be more trauma-aware in your care, too.
Here are some great TIC resources below. They are geared towards physicians, but are applicable to everyone. The link to The National Council Curbside Consult has a fantastic chart that Dr. Sheeler actually printed out and has in her office that details TIC actions.
https://www.aafp.org/afp/2017/0515/p655.html
https://thecurbsiders.com/podcast/218
https://www.cfp.ca/content/64/3/170
Friday Apr 01, 2022
Friday Apr 01, 2022
If you’re reeling after hearing the Radonda Vaught verdict this week, you’re not alone. Mandy and HeHe discuss the verdict and give our own predictions for how this will affect healthcare in the future.
We ask, “did her incident report cause her to possibly go to jail?”
We also review the med error numbers in the U.S. and what’s the advice that’s being given to nurses right now about reporting errors. What are the reports for? How do the benefit patients?
Join us this week as we share our opinions and perspectives (we’re not sharing professional advice, medical advice, or legal advice on this episode or any on our podcast). We’d love to hear how you’re feeling and if your practice will change after this week’s trial. Reach out @pulsecheck.podcast or fill out the form here to be a guest!
Episodes we mentioned:
Nurse Sibyl: here!
Episode 5, Moral Injury: here!
Folks to follow: @yournurselawyer @the.nurse.erica @nursenander
Links:
Friday Mar 25, 2022
Friday Mar 25, 2022
Even if it doesn’t feel like a massive responsibility, being a healthcare professional on the internet means something to consumers. This week we’re discussing a recent encounter Mandy had with a physician on Instagram, and it led to a lot of great lessons!
This person was talking about their personal feelings, their personal experiences, but they definitely carried some weight, because she was “Dr.” on her profile.
It’s probably due to consumer bias, but consumers of social media assume you know more than they do about a topic when you share about it. Even if it’s just a personal opinion or anecdote! Yikes!
It’s new to us to have so much access to so many healthcare professionals, so it’s understandable that it will take some time for all of us to learn how to navigate healthcare content on social media. It’s interesting to watch it evolve.
Do you follow some favorite healthcare pros on Tik Tok or Instagram?
Ever find yourself buying their recommendation or reading the books they're reading?
Interesting, huh?!
Medical influencers - there are for sure pros and cons to these online relationships!
Friday Mar 11, 2022
Friday Mar 11, 2022
Our guest today is a systems nurse, and we definitely had to ask “what’s that?!” Find out how Claire flips the script on the “broken nursing system” and what she, has a change maker and systems thinker says about what to do when nurses hands are tied — or are they?
She gives some must-hear advice for new grads and even some actionable steps we can all start taking immediately to improve the healthcare system for our whole community. If you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed, she’s talking to you!
Thank you, Claire, for your time and perspective on today’s podcast!
Find Claire Phillips on the ‘gram @nursing.the.system
And we’ll also be stalking her site for her new career development course coming soon (Interview with Intention) at www.nursingthesystem.com.
We can’t wait to learn more about her Changemaker Pyramid, too!
While you’re on IG, don’t forget to follow us @pulsecheck.podcast
Friday Mar 04, 2022
Friday Mar 04, 2022
The phrases and the tone that healthcare professionals use is probably routine, just another day at work. But today we want to talk about what it's like on the other side of this medical jargon and routine language.
HeHe shares a story about recent language used with one of her clients in the hospital suddenly turned scary.
Share your fav quotes from a recent episode on Instagram from our page: www.instagram.com/pulsecheck.podcast
If you have a story you’d like to share with us about your experience inside the halls of US healthcare, send us some info here: https://forms.gle/t5RE3a8t8PhLJc7U9
Friday Feb 25, 2022
Friday Feb 25, 2022
Recently, a hospital system showed their true colors when they put a restraining order on seven previous employees from taking a better job offer across town. That’s right, instead of a stellar counter offer to the stroke care team, the hospital system took them to court and blamed the staff for limiting the community’s access to critical medical care.
Even if you’re not part of this 7-person stroke team and you’re not affected by this court hearing in Wisconsin, this legal battle is important to hear about. It’s a very clear example of the lengths the healthcare facilities in the U.S. will go to underpay and undervalue some of their most talented staff. It may just be rounding down your clock-out time on your time card or auto-deducting your lunch break, but this lawsuit is an example of hospital facilities flexing their perceived ownership of their employees. Healthcare employers don’t have our best interests in mind. Healthcare professionals need to have confidence in our value.
HeHe makes a great point in this week’s episode:
“You deserve to be treated with respect and dignity and have your boundaries respected that you have set with your employer and that you have set for your time off of work.
So if those are constantly being violated, reevaluate, whether your place of employment actually values you or do they actually just view you as another warm body on the floor?"
Here’s the article we reference in the podcast:
Friday Feb 18, 2022
Friday Feb 18, 2022
Today we’re joined by special guest, Nurse Allie, a hospice nurse who’s passionate about what hospice nursing is really like. She believes that new grad nurse residency programs should be commonplace and readily available to nurses all over the country! She also has some great tips for anyone curious about the hospice field.
On this episode of Pulse Check Podcast, we get to ask Allie:
- How did she get started with hospice nursing?
- What do you recommend is the first step for someone who wants experience as a hospice nurse?
- Where do you pee when you’re doing home visits?
- What are some things that make your job difficult or easier outside of the hospital?
- Is hospice nursing just about morphine drips and hand massages?
- And so much more!
Thank you, Nurse Allie, for your candid conversation and passion for end of life care. We’ve loved getting a peek into why you’re so passionate about your job and your patients. If you have a story or want to share about your corner of healthcare, drop us a line here! We love to help bring humanity back to healthcare.
Follow along with Nurse Allie:
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nurse.allie
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nurse_allie
Nurse Penny - another hospice nurse to follow: https://www.instagram.com/itsnursepenny/
Friday Feb 11, 2022
Friday Feb 11, 2022
Let’s talk about the proposed “nurse pay cap” and what that would mean for the healthcare industry. This topic can be quite controversial, but there are a few takeaways:
All consumers that are able can contact your local representatives to let them know how you feel about legislation, advocate for competitive nurse pay.
Also, what you hear in the news and on social media is rarely ever the whole story.
This week it’s about hospitals accusing travel nurse agencies of bleeding them of all of their money so that they can stay in business. For the last 2 years hospitals have complained that supply shortages are to blame. Covid is to blame for too many sick patients; hospitals can’t keep up. In years past it’s been that revenues are down, costs keep rising, insurance payouts are low, it’s allllways something.
Are travel nurses agencies Really getting paid billions of dollars?
It’s an interesting topic and we’ll keep discussing it as it revolves in the next few weeks and moths!
Read the letter and signees here:
https://morgangriffith.house.gov/uploadedfiles/wh_nurse_staffing.pdf
Find your state representative and let them know you don’t support this letter: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative
Here’s where the ANA stands with nurses:
If you're in L&D, check out www.traumainformedbirthnurse.com for trauma-informed care training from over 15 educators and experts plus Live online support by a trauma therapist.
As always, you can follow along with us on Instagram at: @pulsecheck.podcast