‘Cautiously optimistic’: small signs of hope against Omicron surge

Signs of hope as Nebraska is beginning to see numbers decline slowly but surely. Hospitalizations going from 750 to 627 offer a glimmer of hope, but the fight isn't over yet, especially for frontline workers.

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) –Signs of hope as Nebraska is beginning to see numbers decline slowly but surely.

Hospitalizations going from 750 to 627 offer a glimmer of hope, but the fight isn’t over yet, especially for frontline workers.

“Over these last couple of years, they’ve endured so much fear. Fear of the disease for them and their families, mostly prior to the vaccine. Constantly changing practices, staffing shortages, critical capacity issues, supply chain issues, unimaginable suffering and exhaustion, leading to compassion fatigue. Grateful patients and families and very hostile and aggressive patients and families at the same time,” Lisa Vail, the chief nursing officer at Bryan Health, said of the pandemic.

The mental toll the pandemic has taken on frontline workers and nurses has been tough. It’s a big reason so many are leaving the industry.

“We had 1/3 of our new hires, our first year nurses, leave the organization in the last fiscal year. That’s the highest we’ve ever seen. So, the pandemic is definitely impacting our staffing,” Dr. Sue Nuss, the chief nursing officer at Nebraska Medicine, said.

Hospitals like UNMC are now offering an incentive bonus for nurses who pick up one extra shift per week for 12 weeks.

They say they are doing what they can to keep the nurses they currently have and bring more in the door. While we may be seeing some signs of hope when it comes to the end of an omicron surge, it doesn’t mean we are totally in the clear.

“I would say we need to be cautiously optimistic. Every time we feel like we’re getting out of this, a new variant comes a different surge comes. We just don’t know yet. So, I would say cautiously optimistic,” Dr. Nuss said.