Get ready for a big ol' rant!
When I say "the hospital" I, of course, mean the leadership in my hospital.
Whatever superficial words they may say, and whatever superficial gestures they may put on, their actions in leadership prove their hatred for patients and workers. We are grievously understaffed!
Ever since COVID-19, our patient numbers have gone up over 30% (as of last year) and are now probably closer to 50% higher than prior to COVID-19. Yet, our staffing has barely gone up - among resident physicians such as myself, it's increased by less than 10%.
We have a designation called "DISA" which stands for DISAster. Disaster teams are residents that are pulled from their electives to take care of patients who are stuck in the ED because the hospitals beds are full. The disaster designation is supposed to be used exactly for the situations it suggests - disaster situations. It's not supposed to be a regular situation.
Yet, the vast majority of our days over the past two years have had disaster designations. This past year, we probably had only or two days (out of 365) where we did not use the disaster designation.
This is unsustainable, and it is extremely dangerous.
The patient-to-resident ratio is increasing steadily. Even though we've been promised more staffing for years, we're still yet to see it happen, and we're carrying more patients as time goes on. More patients means less time per patient, which leads to more errors and longer wait times for things to get done.
The patient-to-nurse ratio is also increasing. A nurse can only attend to so many duties at a time, and giving them multiple patients, sometimes spread across an entire elongated floors, guarantees that they will miss something. It also puts pressure on the nurses to accomplish everything that's ordered by doctors, and this causes tension between us. The poor staffing ratio quite literally promotes a toxic work environment.
The patient-o-ancillary staff ratio also continues to increase. This means that basic and advanced imaging, bloodwork, etc. all gets delayed and/or rushed through. This leads to errors and frustration for patients and their families. The blame for delays and errors ultimately falls on the doctors (even though we have as much control over this as the patients). Doctors end up being treated as the enemy.
The proper to solution to this? Hire more people!
Nope. Our hospital system is too cheap to do this.
They received a billion dollar grant a few years ago, and guess what they spent it on? Constructing a new building and advertising so that they could bring in more patients. Not more staff, but more patients. Whoever made this decision can go to hell. This decision has hurt people.
I should also mention that, while this new building was being created, our residents asked for a single resident lounge. It was denied multiple times. We still don't have a resident lounge in the new building. We're the ones who basically run the hospital, but they couldn't grant a single room for literally several dozens of people.
We managed to snag some workspaces in the new building, but these are just workspaces. There's nowhere for us to place our stuff, store some food, or even lie down for a ew moments if we're tired and need a break (which is necessary because we're so overloaded with patients). They simply do not care.
If this is not hatred towards patients and workers, I don't know what is. I'm thrilled that I'm leaving this place in a few months. If they were humane, I may have stayed to work there. Even though residents are temporary workers, we still have decades of a career in front of us, and treating us as disposable rags ensures that they hospital loses valuable people in the future.
