Done : nursing

i've learned more about the real on-the-ground ugliness of COVID from r/nursing than I've learned from any other source. Even the most unflinching media portrayals of what COVID does to the unvaccinated and the people who have to care for them leaves a lot out.

[...]

for example last week i learned that a lot of nurses have had to deal with maggots in the intubated bodies of COVID patients, because anybody who has to be intubated for as long as many COVID patients do makes an attractive home for fly larvae, even when they're still alive

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  • p_sharikov [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Holy shit, I'm reading /r/nursing right now and... just... how are people so fucking shitty to nurses who are actively trying to save their lives? This is a diseased society in every sense of the word.

    • CTHlurker [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      When the only type of Class-consciousness that is allowed is that of a consumer, and Healthcare is explicitly referred to as a service you're purchasing like any other, people will demand the same level of obedience and kow-towing as they do of a McDonalds worker. Couple that with the highly emotional events that puts most people into contact with nurses, and you get an atmosphere that is not going to be nice. Then you add the fact that nurses are seen as lesser than doctors, and that nurses have the most direct contact with patients, and shit gets really fucking bad.

      I have some family in the States, and its fucking wild hearing some of their stories about working in a hospital. My family-member works in a hospital in Tennessee and she is genuinely struggling to get her children and husband to take Covid seriously at all. Since the husband is a Chud, he is completely beyond reach, even by his own wife.

      • Caocao [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        The power of ideology is truly breathtaking. I saw a poster on patriots.win who was convinced his own son was a "crisis actor" after there was a shooting at the son's school

        • CTHlurker [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Oh yeah. That was one of the parkland kids if I’m not mistaken. Absolutely breathtaking the level of brainwashing that right wing media has managed over the past 30-40 years.

    • zifnab25 [he/him, any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      how are people so fucking shitty to nurses who are actively trying to save their lives?

      As someone who has been in the hospital for various things once or twice, you're typically in a lot of pain and other forms of discomfort. I recently threw my back out, and was functionally bedridden for a few days. Shouting "please will someone bring me my piss bottle so I don't wet the bed I am begging you!" at the top of my lungs was not my proudest moment or my most diplomatic.

      That, plus the anxiety/terror associated with not understanding what is wrong, leads to people being very ill-tempered.

      • princeofsin [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        The country can be saved but I don't know about the American hogs

      • bigboopballs [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Well, it could be made into an endless expanse of old growth forest with no certain borders again... maybe...

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      The only time I've been mean to a nurse or healthcare worker is when I was out of my mind on morphine after a massive operation. Otherwise I've always treated healthcare workers with the utmost respect.

      Do people really do otherwise? What the actual fuck is this world.

    • charly4994 [she/her, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I got called the t-slur by a patiient a couple months before covid hit and I haven't been able to get a job since because I told her to fuck off. People treat us like absolute shit and we just have to take it because "professionalism" is an industry-wide fetish by those in power. I had a terrible time before covid and from my understanding, literally every bad thing has just been turned up to 11 and I don't know how people are actually still going. We're overloading the healthcare system and also burning out fresh and veteran nurses so our healthcare system is going to be even worse going forward. Who wants to deal with the trauma and PTSD when you can just go find a job working at some soulless corp for the same pay and only having to deal with an asshole manager that you already had to deal with as a nurse.

  • AcidSmiley [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Any society that values human life would simply force people to get vaxxed in a situation like this. Of course, liberalism prioritizes the freedom to join a literal death cult instead.

    • axont [she/her, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I would genuinely not bat an eyelash if people were dragged out of their homes to get vaccinated. I have a large family that's full of chuds and it's getting smaller. 22 of my relatives have died of covid. Around 50 have gotten it and have severe health complications now.

      Force these people to take it. I don't give a shit anymore. Shoot them in the neck with a vaccine dart. Make it illegal for them to work. I'm fucking desperate.

  • Crowtee_Robot [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Nurses deserve a memorial in every goddamn state for the shit (figurative and literal) they have to deal with. US hospitals are a horror show.

  • zifnab25 [he/him, any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    for example last week i learned that a lot of nurses have had to deal with maggots in the intubated bodies of COVID patients, because anybody who has to be intubated for as long as many COVID patients do makes an attractive home for fly larvae, even when they’re still alive

    • Claims to be Pro-Life

    • Complains about flies in their intubation tubing

    Curious

  • buh [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    takes ivermectin, an antiparasitic medicine

    maggots move in anyways

    • UmbraVivi [he/him, she/her]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I don't think maggots are really parasites because from what i remember, they're only interested in things that are already dead/rotten. Maggots can even be used for medical purposes because if you put them in an open wound, they will only eat dead tissue and perfectly clean the wound with impressive precision. It's really gross but also super interesting imo.

      • Mardoniush [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Not entirely true, some species only eat dead flesh (and are useful in medicine) but your standard blowfly maggot will eat what it can chomp on.

  • ssjmarx [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    shoving rectal tubes in you because your ass is falling off because of COVID poop

    How is this image not front and center of the vaccine campaign? I got vaccinated but if I were on the fence it's visceral shit like this that would scare me into getting it.

    • blobjim [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I hear about a new awful symptom of COVID-19 every month that sounds so awful it makes the media coverage of it look like even more of a cover-up so they can get things "back to normal" so we can "live with COVID".

      • TrudeauCastroson [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        Honestly the stuff that got me to vaccinate ASAP was what can happen to you in what's noted as a 'mild' case where you don't go to the hospital, otherwise I might have been more partial to hesitate with that "psh it only gets the olds, I'll wait until it's proven safe" BS.

        Myocarditis, people who did marathons not having enough stamina to go up stairs, brain fog, the Texas Roadhouse ceo who committed suicide because he got tinnitus, long term effects we don't even know (like people who got Russian flu in 1890s were more likely to die in the Spanish flu after WW1), etc.

        There's even a trumpy NHL player who was antivax, got covid, now has myocarditis after 'recovery' so they won't medically clear him to play and his career might be over.

      • bigboopballs [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        It's honestly amazing how little anyone talks about the "long covid" effects.

  • john_browns_beard [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    My SO is an ICU nurse and she had to transition to a part-time position to keep herself from having a mental breakdown. She mostly keeps the gory details to herself, but I've heard so many stories of Zoom call "last goodbyes" that I know how bad it is.

    Basically with Delta, if you have to go into the ICU, you're 99.5% going to die. And these are people in their 30s and 40s who are healthy with the exception of maybe one comorbidity. But they are ALL unvaccinated. They haven't seen a vaccinated death yet.

    • MemesAreTheory [he/him, any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Making me feel better about the potential for Vaccines to genuinely get this under control. Covid is never leaving, but if we can reasonably keep protection up with vaccines (scoping out problem variants ahead of time and preparing new vaccines for those, similar to the flu) then I'll take that as a hopefully possible outcome.

  • GVAGUY3 [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    One thing I think we could do to get people on our side is allow workers to stand up to shitty customers

  • LoudMuffin [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    for example last week i learned that a lot of nurses have had to deal with maggots in the intubated bodies of COVID patients, because anybody who has to be intubated for as long as many COVID patients do makes an attractive home for fly larvae, even when they’re still alive maggots

    :agony-deep: :agony-immense: :agony-limitless: :agony-mescaline:

    END IT

  • twitter [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    :le-pol-face: No, I have economic anxiety.

    • BGDelirium [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Found out about that subreddit a couple of weeks ago.

      Definitely a great place to revel in the idiocy of chuds choking down horse meds while refusing vaccines, then meeting a karmic end

    • Mardoniush [she/her]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Honestly, Covid has made me go from shocked looks at "(Mild Socialist talking point, maybe an edgy Guillotine meme for my left-lib friends)" to a laugh followed by sage nodding at "Our only hope is Climate Stalin"

    • D3FNC [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      On the flip side I got banned from the nursing forum for communist propaganda, gotta remember a lot of nurses move into hospital administration real quick after seeing how terrible bedside nursing is. Can't say I blame them.

    • bigboopballs [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      r/nursing r/HermanCainAwards r/LeopardsAteMyFace r/CovidAteMyFace r/QAnonCasualties - all completely wild subs

    • AcidSmiley [she/her]
      ·
      3 years ago

      From reading the thread linked at the top of OP's post, they mostly show up in bedsores or other open wounds, but they ... i'll spoiler this because it's so fucking gross.

      spoiler

      The maggots sometimes start nesting in the nose as well. These patients can't move, don't breathe through their nose for weeks and the nose is also full of slime, so some flies think it makes for a perfect nest. It seems they sometimes show up in the vent tubes as well.

      • emizeko [they/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago
        spoiler

        yeah I couldn't even bring myself to ask what I meant which was NOT IN THE RESPIRATORY TRACT RIGHT?

        • AcidSmiley [she/her]
          ·
          3 years ago

          I've heard doctors talk about removing maggots from necrotized tissue in the past, but that stuff just hits differently.

          • NephewAlphaBravo [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago
            As I understand it that's... kind of a mixed blessing.

            They only eat dead tissue, which was going to cause its own problems anyway.

            Not that it's good for them to do that except on purpose and tightly controlled

            • TheLepidopterists [he/him]
              ·
              3 years ago

              My understanding is that some kinds of maggots prefer dead tissue (the kinds that would be used to remove rotting flesh) but the idea that any of them eat it exclusively is a bit of a myth.

              • UmbraVivi [he/him, she/her]
                ·
                3 years ago

                maggot therapy is an actual treatment that exists and is still legitimate, there are definitely some maggots that will exclusively eat rotting flesh

                when i had the displeasure of finding maggots in my apartment once, i did notice that they seem to be surprisingly picky eaters

    • FidelCashflow [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      If it helps, there are situations in which people have mostly died. This particular thing is what got me radiclaizes in the first place. That family member is likely braindead or if not, near enough to brain dead that actual braindeath woudl be preferred. And while in this mostly dead state they are getting major money paid for their care that isn't helping and they cannot enjoy. This is money in the half million dollae range just wasted on a corpse and then some fortune 500 company.

      So for this situation, the person would have been on a coctail of powerful medications to keep their lungs open and their heart beating. Unfortunately, the ammount of drugs to that in high enough doses for long enough time can kill most the other organs.

      So for flies to nest like that they have to be undercleanred. Which will easily happen in a state with poor labor law and overworked staff.

      It is the hat trick of failed conservative ideology. No vaccine, no labor rights, no dignity.

  • panopticon [comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Jfc that is horrible, god damn... obviously the pandemic isn't over but ever since getting my shots I sort of forgot how horrific it was when this thing first broke out.

    Fuck :doomer:

      • GreenTeaRedFlag [any]
        ·
        3 years ago

        it's not so much that as the sending pictures of her feet to her husband, or just the weird tone about getting food and drink shoved in her mouth. Just kinda weird, not necessarily wrong.

        • Bernies3trlnKielbasa [he/him]
          ·
          edit-2
          3 years ago

          just the weird tone about getting food and drink shoved in her mouth.

          She's fucking exhausted and that's an expression of it. There's not a lot to it.

          • GreenTeaRedFlag [any]
            ·
            3 years ago

            I usually express that as shoving food into my own mouth, as do most people around me. I'm not saying she's necessarily eating ice cream of off someone or something like that, just that it is kinda weird. The phrasing is off.

          • GreenTeaRedFlag [any]
            ·
            3 years ago

            yeah that's what I mean. There's some uncomfortable ambiguity there for me.