EVERY morning before her shift starts, nurse Mercy Mosemedi likes to read letters from patients who have just been discharged from hospital.
They warm her heart, she says.
The thank-you letters are mostly hand-written notes from numerous patients, including those who survived Covid-19.
Some of them never thought they would make it out of the hospital alive.
One particular letter reads: “I want to thank all the nurses who treated me very well at the Covid-19 ward. May the Lord bless them. I will never forget them in my whole life.”
Mosemedi (25) is a nurse in the Covid-19 ward at the Roman Catholic Hospital in Windhoek.
When she feels overwhelmed, she says she recites a prayer or goes back to read those letters to keep her strong.
To Mosemedi and her colleagues, the letters are reminders that their work matters. That they are appreciated.
Some of the letters are posted on a board in the area where she and other nurses clock in.
Within these four walls, she has met patients who were on the brink of death, but they miraculously pulled through.
“The good thing is, these letters are posted where we clock in so whenever we clock in and we feel down, we see the letters and all the negativity is out of the window,” Mosemedi tells The Namibian.
At exactly 06h20, she joins the rest of the hospital staff for breakfast before putting on her personal protective gear.
At 07h00, the team listens to a prayer on the intercom throughout the entire hospital in every room.
“Our Father, who art in heaven,” the prayer rings across the halls.
The Namibian meets Mosemedi just after her lunch break. She looks exhausted. She says as a nurse, it sometimes becomes difficult to be motivated, especially during the third wave of the pandemic.
“The third wave came to us like a surprise because the numbers picked up like crazy. This really took a lot from us,” she adds.
She pauses for a second, as a heart monitor beeps in the next room.
After her brief pause, she smiles as she remembers there are patients showing signs of recovery. These are some of the patients who write them ‘thank you’ notes later.
She formed a bond with some of them during their stay in hospital.
“At a point, you realise you have to balance being a nurse and being their mother or friend, because you are the only one they see every day.
“You create a bond with them. One beautiful thing is that you start hearing them telling you their oxygen levels are going up. It is so soothing to hear that from them,” she says.
On a separate day, The Namibian meets Laurinda Dumba from the same hospital. Dumba is responsible for welcoming new patients.
She has welcomed patients experiencing shortness of breath and those who could barely stand on their own.
“Most times they come here with private transport then we have to take them in on stretchers or wheelchairs because of their condition,” Dumba says, almost getting emotional.
The hard part, she says, was telling patients “there is no bed for them”.
Dumba says she was overwhelmed at the beginning, but later convinced herself she had to be strong for the patients in her care.
FINDING HOPE IN LITTLE THINGS
Like Mosemedi, prayer and teamwork are a big source of inspiration for her.
“The only thing I can do is pray for strength for one more day. As a team, we encourage teamwork and our staff to work together. We try working together because it is the only way we can deal with this. Doing it alone is impossible,” Dumba says.
She adds that without a little work and education, prayer and hope alone do not change anything. Dumba says because of this, she educates her family and takes precautionary measures.
“As a nurse, when I get home, I make sure I do not touch anyone. I remove my uniform outside first, take a bath and then carefully interact with the family,” she added. Talking through her worries seems to lighten Dumba’s mood, and she shortly returns to welcoming incoming patients.
The nursing service manager at the hospital, Bernadette Shipanga, has finally gotten off the phone.
She takes a seat in the conference room to tell The Namibian how she motivates her staff through small gestures. She admits the nurses have been working around the clock.
“You know, if you give somebody money, they get excited and motivated, so when the nurses work overtime, we pay them extra as well,” she said.
She says she always takes the time to listen to staff requests.
“What management does also is listen to their pleas. When they ask for chocolate for the day, we go out and buy it for them. When they ask for something else, we try as much as possible to give it to them,” Shipanga added.
In addition to the ‘thank you’ letters from patients, Shipanga says sometimes members of the public bring them coffee and other goodies to show their support.
“I must also compliment the community. They really stand behind us. It really encourages the staff to soldier on,” she said.
For the staff of the Roman Catholic Hospital, it is these small gestures that help them soldier on in the midst of a raging pandemic.