Since the beginning of COVID-19 healthcare workers have experienced hardships in their fields daily. Along with the usual cases that occur in the hospital, the nurses were getting new patients every minute with COVID-19. Turing their usual two to three patients per shift into five or six depending on the day.

“I just got out of nursing school December 2019, my first few months as a resident were great but when March 2020 hit, I got thrown into a whole new world.”- Jasmine Carter, ER Nurse

Since COVID-19 nurses have been experiencing “burnout” especially with the new grads at that time. They were barely able to learn what it’s like to be a nurse when their workload doubled, almost tripled. Zaharia Newton graduated nursing school in the heart of the pandemic in December 2020. “I was unable to get the proper training I need to feel okay and comfortable as a nurse, plain and simple I was lost.” She was thrown into the job and felt unprepared.

They were not only fighting to save their patients lives but their own with this new virus that irrupted everyday life.

Those in healthcare were the backbone of the pandemic, but unfortunately some of them felt unappreciated. “We were put through so much physically and mentally and at times I felt like it went unnoticed,” said Newton.

Once the pandemic began to slow down veteran and new grad nurses were still feeling that after shock of this tragedy. “The feeling was like what you feel after you get off a fast rollercoaster, where you’re almost in disbelief of the events that just happened,” said Carter.

Post COVID-19 more problems began mounting at hospitals across the nation. They try to deal with widespread staffing shortages, overworked nurses beaten down by the pandemic and a busted pipeline of new nurses. They felt unappreciated and under-compensated for everything that they were put through. New York’s two busiest hospitals had over 7,000 thousand nurses go on strike. It was a three-day strike at Mount Sinai Hospital and Montefiore Medical Center.

Carter said, “Nurses don’t feel like their voices have been heard with this exact topic. Nurses are now feeling like they need to strike. That could continue.” Even after the strikes, protest and negations bedside nurses were still feeling the after affects greatly.

“The money wasn’t even worth it anymore.”- Zaharia Newton, nurse

Newton began looking at other options besides bedside nursing that she could do with her degree. That’s where she found aesthetic nursing. An aesthetic nurse is a registered nurse (RN) specifically trained to administer aesthetic services. Aesthetic procedures typically involve in-office, noninvasive treatments rather than surgery.

After doing research and taking a few courses on aesthetic, Newton landed a job at a medical spa in Atlanta, Georgia where she’s worked for six months now. “I have never felt more peace yet important at work before, trust me it’s not easy work but its fulfilling,” said Newton.