The Strike, the Shift, and Beyond

In Part II of Nurse to Health, we revisit the award-winning film Late Shift (directed by Petra Volpe)—this time through the voices of the next generation of nurses.Joined by Hofstra graduate nursing students Jessica Keenan and Aaron Mandel, we reflect on the film’s raw portrayal of a single nurse navigating the realities of modern healthcare. The conversation comes on the heels of the historic 2026 New York City nursing strike—the largest in NYC history—where approximately 15,000 members of the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) took action across major systems including Montefiore, Mount Sinai, and NewYork-Presbyterian.We explore what it means to enter nursing at this moment—how frontline conditions shape training, expectations, and the future of the profession, and of healthcare itself.