KUMC Nursing Student V.S. COVID-19

For the past several month’s Coronavirus has taken over and changed the lives of people all over the world. While everyone is adapting to the changes, COVID-19 has heightened the need for first responders around the world and across the U.S. The virus has affected many and is far from being over. From a college student’s perspective, the virus took away their last semesters of the 2019-2020 school year and has made normal learning a bit of a challenge. After a long 5 months at home, students are now back trying to get used to the new changes made here at The University of Kansas.

Taking a deeper look into what life is now like for a college student, Meagan Biesiadecki, a KUMC nursing student took the time to sit down for an interview about the changes COVID-19 has made in her life.

In the interview, Meagan explained that KUMC nursing students have one week of classes in person and one week of classes online. The students go from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m and are required to wear scrubs, and of course a mask. Meagan said, “I feel KUMC is trying to do the best they can while making us feel as normal as possible.”

While attending classes Meagan has been educated on COVID-19 and has a deeper understanding of what the virus is. Meagan said, “In our clinical lab we had a bunch of nurses that work on the COVID-19 floor and the COVID hotline come in and teach us about how serious it is and some myths about COVID.” Meagan has high hopes for our future “I believe once elderly patients, healthcare, and frontline workers get a vaccine or become immune to it, then that will help stop the virus from taking down our society” said Meagan.

A major part that makes up any university is the professors. Meagan said, “ Our faculty is probably one of the best I’ve ever heard of because they all want to help us succeed.”

Meagan plans to one day do travel nursing and maybe even work in the emergency department. Meagan said, “ The ER is fast-paced and there's a lot going on it's invigorating and it's frustrating but it's exciting and you just learn everything in there and I think I would like that.”

This is an eye-opening experience for KUMC students because they are the ones who will one day be helping infected patients. Anyone can say they want to do this or that when they are older, it’s times like this that show who the true leaders are, who will be there no matter what to give a helping hand. A major question that was asked during Meagan’s interview was, How is the pandemic affecting the views of students currently studying in the medical field about their career choices? Has the virus scared the students away? Or made them more interested and passionate about their field? Meagan answered with, “ I think it might for some people but, a big part of nursing is resiliency and it shows there is always something else we could be doing, could be helping with, and could be moving forward in” “As a nursing class as a whole it shows that we have a passion for it.”