DENVER — After Gov. Jared Polis (D-Colorado) put out a call for professionals to help bolster the state's medical staff to help slow down COVID-19, thousands responded.
That includes Dr. Lori Szczukowski, who's worked as a doctor for more than 35 years, 20 of which were spent at Denver Health before she retired three years ago.
"I felt it was time to do something different," she said, "It's hard to give up practicing medicine. I wanted to be a doctor since I was 13."
Then she heard the governor ask medical providers to come back to work if they can in light of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus.
"I contacted the people I worked with at Denver Health," Szczukowski said. "You want to help. You want to be able to do something."
Now via telehealth she is specifically working with other medical providers at Denver Health and city employees who are falling sick.
"The people who keep everyone else well, we keep them well," she said.
Some people are coming back to paid positions.
The governor's office said 2,738 health care professionals are also volunteering. This includes students, medical providers picking up extra shifts and 350 people coming out of retirement or who are over the age of 65.
Doctors like Szczukowski are working via telehealth.
Ingrid Johnson, the president and CEO of the Colorado Center for Nursing Excellence, a nursing workforce center, said in talking with different hospital systems, some nurses have been asked to care for sicker patients so nurses coming back to work are stepping in to help care for people who aren't as ill.
Johnson said in Colorado, nurses aren't evenly distributed through the state.
"Our nursing workforce is not evenly distributed geographically and there are always requests for more experienced nurses in specialty positions," she wrote in an email to 9NEWS. "If you live in a rural or undeserved community, it is likely that there is a shortage of nurses.
"If you live in an urban or affluent community, you are less likely to be experiencing a nursing shortage."
Johnson said a big concern for the center is nursing students who need clinical practice before joining the workforce, but healthcare systems are so overwhelmed by COVID-19 it's difficult to take students on at this time.
"The Colorado Council of Nurse Educators, which includes every nursing education program in the state, in partnership with the Colorado Center for Nursing Excellence, the state's nursing workforce center, has sent a letter to the Department of Regulatory Agencies and the Governor's office," Johnson wrote. "The letter requested waivers for a period of one year to allow the students to complete their clinical rotations using a higher percentage of simulation during the waiver period.
"This would remove the burden of educating the students from the already overburdened healthcare facilities while giving the soon-to-be-graduated students patient care experience. Ideally, this will allow those students to graduate in spring or summer and ensure the nursing workforce pipeline is not interrupted. "
The Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies said they are working through their rules and regulations and said health care professionals interested in helping can learn more through the following websites:
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