A quick warning, there are curse words that are unbeaped in today's episode of the show.

If you prefer a beeped version, you can find that at our website, thisamericanlife.org.

Cassie Arby is in somebody who likes being in the spotlight.

That kind of the opposite.

As she wasn't looking to get in a newspaper, the night that she did the thing that got

her national attention.

She was just showing up to work like normal at the emergency room, at a hospital an hour

or so outside Seattle, St. Michael's Medical Center.

So that night when I came in at 7, I was looking at the number of patients that were there,

which was high.

Like really high.

People were all over the lobby in a messy chaos.

Sitting in wheelchairs because it's a weren't enough regular chairs.

Sitting on the floor.

Six kids and their parents, ambulance crews, and patients waiting to be seen.

Cassie says it was like an airport gate where the flights just been canceled.

A lot of dissatisfaction, a lot of unrest.

And she was short staffed.

Cassie says it's charge nurse.

So it's her job to make sure all these patients get seen.

And that she has enough staff to do that.

Which has been a problem since COVID.

...