Managing Burnout In Healthcare And The Road To Balance

An Interview with Jessica Garcia Zayas, Medical Laboratory Technologist at Baptist Health South Florida, on burnout, self-care, and finding balance during the pandemic.

For those who have been listening to the podcast for a while, you know I have a special place in my heart for healthcare workers. While most people think of Nurses and Doctors when they think about healthcare, there are many other careers that make up the healthcare industry, including laboratory services.

My guest on this episode, Jessica Garcia Zayas, is one of the Medical Laboratory Technologists who runs all the tests on your blood and samples when you submit them to your doctor. This also means that she and her team are the ones who process COVID-19 tests submitted to the hospital. We spent a few minutes talking about the impact of the pandemic and the focus on her department to be careful and efficient (which they always have been).

Long before a pandemic was in sight, Jessica shared with me the stress and burnout caused by her career and life. While she has always loved her work and taken care of her family, she hit a season where she wasn't managing herself well and it landed her in the hospital - thankfully she works in one!

This experience opened Jessica's eyes to learning how to self-care and set better boundaries for herself. She always had the support of her team, her manager, and her family, but now it was time for her to manage her thoughts and actions. This led Jessica to start doing Yoga, becoming a certified instructor, and started her own business helping others manage themselves well.

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