An Open Letter to the Nursing Class of 2022

May 17

May 17 An Open Letter to the Nursing Class of 2022

Graduating nursing class of 2022, you did it! Congratulations! My name is Brandon Jones, and aside from serving as an Adjunct Clinical Faculty at Virginia Western, I help lead our Patient Experience work for Carilion Clinic, and I am currently serving as the President of the Virginia Board of Nursing. But today, I write this open letter to you as a future colleague, and I would like to take this opportunity to share what’s on my heart for each of you today, the graduating Nursing Class of 2022, as you enter this incredible profession called nursing.

So, I have no doubt many have heard the words “Patient’s First” before, if not all of you. I think I fundamentally understand what people are trying to say when they say “patients first.” It’s something we hear all the time, patient’s first, putting the patient first. Nonetheless, I am telling you today that healthcare must stop talking about putting patients first and talk about putting the patient at the center of the work we are doing. Putting patients first is not patient-centered. These are two completely different things. What we should seek in healthcare is to be more patient-centered, where the patient is at the center of every decision, every discussion, every strategy, and everything we do. To put your patients first, truly put patients first, those who will be entrusted to you for their care, you must put yourself first. Think about this for just a moment. You will be coming to work for 8/10/12/14/16 hours a day (please don’t work sixteen hours, that’s a soapbox for another post)…anyway, and you will be pouring yourself out into other people. Literally pouring yourself out into other humans, and if you are empty, you can’t then pour out into others. If you are empty, there is nothing else for you to give. I want to introduce to you a couple of walk-always in this open letter. These aren’t takeaways that you just put in the back of your mind and move on with life. These are walkaways, actionable things you can do on day one as an RN. Walk away #1 – take care of yourself.

Take Care of Yourself

Figure out today how you are going to refresh and recharge and refuel. Because yes, you are heroes…nurses were heroes before COVID, they are heroes during COVID, and will be heroes long after COVID… but you are also human. Just like the humans you will be caring for, you will experience joy and sorrow, happiness and sadness, you’ll have exhaustion, you’ll have doubts, and you’ll experience the ups and the downs involved in caring for other humans…take care of yourself. This is very important because a scary thing is happening in healthcare today. Nurses are not only leaving the bedside, leaving hospitals; they are leaving the profession altogether. And listen, we need you! The patients you will serve need you! Yes, they need the work you will be doing in the role of a nurse while caring for them, and the work you do matters, but not only does the work you do matter you matter. They need the unique talents and abilities and compassion that you bring. We need you! Our community needs you. So, before you ever step foot into the workplace as an RN, please figure out how you will take care of yourself and how you will refresh, refuel, and recharge so you can show up every single shift to care for our community. And class of 2022, you find a workplace, a leader, a team that puts you and your wellness and your wellbeing first so you can take care of others and do not settle for anything less.

Take Care of Yourself

One way we can continue to refresh, refuel, and recharge ourselves, especially amid our work, is a continual, moment-by-moment focus on our purpose. So often, we can become focused on tasks, on getting tasks completed, because your day will be filled with tasks that need to be completed. Hundreds upon hundreds of tasks. Some you will like doing, and quite frankly, some you won’t. But today, I want to challenge you that in a healthcare environment that unfortunately pushes nurses to be task-focused, refuse to allow yourself to be pushed into a task-based mentality and never lose sight of your purpose. Walk away #2…focus on your purpose. Allow your purpose to be the guiding light, the north star behind everything you are doing. Yes, I am putting patients on and off bedpans, that is the task, but the purpose behind doing that work is to improve the health of the communities you are serving. I would contend to you today that a purpose-driven mentality will bring fulfillment regardless of what the task is. So often we seek to find fulfillment in the tasks, but unless you are only doing tasks that you enjoy doing, we can become surprised when we aren’t finding fulfillment in our work. Moment by moment, during the work you are doing, constantly remind yourself of WHY you are doing it, of your purpose for doing the work. So now the question is, do you have a purpose…do you know your purpose?

Focus on your Purpose

Please take a moment in the coming days or weeks and think about why you are going into nursing and write it down. This walkaway comes with a challenge. When you get to your job, for the first two weeks of the work, before you clock into work, stop and think about why you are clocking in. Why you are getting ready to work, recenter yourself on your purpose for doing the work before the work even starts. I would also encourage you to recenter on your way during your work, perhaps in the middle of your day. It will change your perspective on the work you do. Then, keep your why with you. Because a day will come when you are sitting in your car, either before you go in or after your shift, and you sit and think, “why do I do this every day?” Pull that notecard out and remind yourself, recenter yourself on that purpose.

And I want to leave you with one final thought…A plea. Please, include compassion as part of your purpose.

Why? Because compassion isn’t something that is nice to have, or I’ll do it if I have time. Compassion is inextricably woven into the fabric of the healing work we do. The compassion you provide another human being is powerful. It is immeasurably powerful, but the cool thing is compassion is also measurably powerful. There is an existing body of literature and an existing body that shows the measurable, positive impact compassion has on patient outcomes. Compassion is evidence-based medicine! Compassion isn’t just powerful for the patients you are serving; it is also powerful for you as a nurse. The literature shows that when we give compassion, there is a reciprocal effect where we are refilled in the process. Some will tell you that you have to get out and away from the hospital to refuel. That is absolutely part of it. Disconnecting from the work is essential. But it isn’t the only answer. Compassion refills you! We have made remarkable advancements in healthcare over the last decade. We have made incredible advancements in healthcare in just the last year, but the compassion you provide another human being can heal. It is healing, and it can heal the places medicine can’t. Walk away #3, give compassion freely.