It’s safe to say that most of us have reached the burnout stage with COVID-19, and the arrival of the highly transmissible omicron variant isn’t doing much to relieve anyone’s stress.

But if anyone really needs a break — and a moment to decompress — it’s the fearless health care workers in the county who have been on the front lines for two years tending to the sick.

Butler County’s COVID-19 death toll hit 600 this week, and the number of cases is rapidly increasing.

A group of second-level nursing students at Butler County Community College recently researched issues confronting health care workers and presented proposals at BC3’s business and health professions building.

Among the ideas they presented to improve the mental health of nurses overwhelmed by COVID-19 caseloads and staff shortages was on-site therapy for critical care nurses to reduce burnout.

Over the summer, county health care providers told the Eagle that while ebbs and flows in nursing staff is normal, the current situation was a “crisis.”

According to a study by the University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences, about 1.2 million new registered nurses would be needed by 2030 to address staffing shortages, and the average age of nurses has increased because as many retire, they leave schools without a pipeline of teachers to take their place.

Due to a lack of qualified faculty and budget constraints, about 80,000 qualified nursing school applicants were turned away last year. As a result, fewer nursing graduates joined the workforce.

To add to this problem, nurses are leaving the profession amid the COVID-19 pandemic because of the high levels of stress from being surrounded for two years by dying patients.

Some health systems are considering financial incentives to retain staff, but that might not be enough.

“Burnout is crazy high,” said Krista Hartle, a nursing student from Butler. “There’s already a shortage on staff. You’re picking up extra shifts. You’re trying to take care of critically ill patients. You’re running on zero energy.”

The students proposed on-site therapists or on-site therapy rooms at health care facilities to help nurses decompress. This is a good idea. There’s an old expression about how it’s important to take care of yourself as well as others. It doesn’t help if the persons tasked with helping patients are struggling.

We agree with the students that therapy would be beneficial to nurses to mentally handle the workload and emotional toll of COVID-19. Such services are often provided to police and emergency responders, so it’s only fitting that nurses — who have acted so heroically during this pandemic — are offered the same services.

— NCD