Outrage over nurses' TikTok video prompts big questions
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A viral TikTok video of Emory University Hospital Midtown labor and delivery nurses sharing their "icks" about patient behavior sparked outrage this week, prompting many to raise concerns about racial disparities in health care, worker exhaustion and hospital management.
Why it matters: The video struck a nerve with women, particularly Black women, who are up to three times more likely to die during childbirth than their white counterparts across the country.
- In Georgia, Black women were more than twice as likely to die during childbirth between 2018-2020, according to the state Department of Public Health.
What they're saying: "If my pregnant wife has to deliver at a hospital, Emory Midtown is where she’ll go — and as a Black woman, her likelihood of dying increases significantly," one man tweeted.
What's happening: The video has been taken down. Emory Healthcare, which referred to the nurses as "former employees" in a statement said the "disrespectful and unprofessional comments" fell short of the "values and standards we expect every member of our team to hold and demonstrate."
Yes, but: For some, the video wasn't about race. It demonstrated a "lack of professionalism," but also spotlighted healthcare worker exhaustion, State Rep. Jasmine Clark (D-Lilburn), who teaches nursing at Emory, told Axios.
- "I would not say this makes those nurses bad nurses," she told Axios. "I think it makes them human. Nurses right now are going through a lot. We have a nursing shortage. Nurses are being asked to handle longer hours, do more patients and there’s not much they can do about it.”
- Clark cautioned about drawing larger conclusions about racial health care inequity from the video.
- "Does it have to do with race?,” she asked. "I don't know, but what I do know is I think it's a stretch to take a 30-second TikTok video and turn it into an indictment of health care and racism in health care."
Yes, and: Sherress Hicks, founder and CEO of Georgia Maternal Fetal Health Alliance and clinical health educator, told Axios that many of the issues the nurses mentioned could have been addressed by the hospital's administration.
- "If the nurses' level of frustration is that bad that they have to do a TikTok video, [then] something has to be changed within labor and delivery," Hicks said. "What is going to be done in the future proactively to avoid these types of frustrations and concerns that the nurses do have?"
The big picture: Social media posts of nurses and doctors working through the worst of the pandemic went viral regularly, as the country rallied around the medical profession.
- But clanging pots and pans couldn't stop the burnout. At one point in 2021, nearly a quarter of nurses said they were ready to leave their jobs.
- The national "ick" trend sparked videos from nurses across the country.
Threat level: The national supply of nurses dropped by more than 100,000 from 2020 to 2021 — the largest ever observed in 40 years, according to 2022 research report in Health Affairs. Many were under the age of 35 and many left hospital environments, according to the analysis.
The bottom line: "It should not have happened," Clark said of the video. "In this cyber age, we have to be really careful about what we put out into the atmosphere, especially in a state that has one of the highest maternal mortality rates and we’re talking about labor and delivery nurses."
- Hicks also said the video could lead to women being more outspoken about the care they receive.
- "Now every woman who has heard about this video, when they go into labor and delivery, they're going to be looking for those things,” she said.