Fellowship, Finance, and Fervor: Nurses Caring for Nurses During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Background: From March 25-July 8, 2020, the COVID-19 Emergency Grant Program awarded $2,734,500 to 2484 nurses across the United States who experienced economic distress. Significance: The study describes the effect of emergency grant funding on grantees and determines the commonalities of these nurses’ experiences through their written expressions of appreciation in thank you notes. Methodology: This descriptive study used Burnard’s 14 Stages in Qualitative Content Analysis to determine the categories and sub-categories from thank you notes received from grantees. Results: The 99 thank you notes analyzed led to identification of five categories: 1) thanks to Nurses House, Inc., 2) expressions of appreciation, 3) experiencing COVID-19, 4) economic uncertainty, and 5) caring within the professional context. Conclusions: While the thank you notes revealed economic uncertainty amongst these nurses, the thrust of this study revealed the gratitude of nurses who experienced nurses caring for them during pandemic conditions. Nurses caring for each other is a new phenomenon. While the thank you notes revealed the importance of financial support to the grantees during this crisis, this study redefined the impact of nurses caring for nurses.