For trauma workers like Jonathan Bartels, a nurse who has worked in emergency care and palliative care, witnessing death over and over again takes a toll. Over time, they can become numb or burned out.
But about two years ago, after Bartels and his team at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville tried and failed to resuscitate a patient, something happened.
“We had worked on this patient for hours and the chaplain came in and kind of stopped everyone from leaving the room, and I’m like, ‘Wow, that’s really bold,’ ” he said. “She said, ‘I’m just going to pray over this patient and then you all can leave.’ And I watched it and I felt – it was the act of stopping people — really inspired me.”
While the prayer wasn’t totally comfortable to him because Bartels, like many at the hospital, is from a different religious tradition, the pause felt right.
“So the next time we worked on another person who didn’t make it, I...
Posted By: Jeni Fa
Saturday, October 3rd 2015 at 1:00AM
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