Carillon is published by the
University of the Philippines
Office of Alumni Relations
Caring for those who Care
By Daisy Monica M. Poliquit & Kathlyn Sharmaine Valdez
Sometimes support begins with a message, a nurse reaching out after a difficult shift, a colleague checking in after a distressing clinical event, or a peer counselor making space for someone who is not ready to speak in a crowded room. The technology may be simple, but the support it helps set in motion is deeply human. Someone listens. Someone responds. Someone is reminded that asking for help is an act of courage, not weakness.
This is the work of the Philippine General Hospital C.A.R.E. Society for Nurses. C.A.R.E. stands for Counseling and Assistance towards Recovery and Empowerment. The organization was built on a truth familiar to every health worker – those who care for others also need care. In a public hospital where nurses carry the physical and emotional weight of illness, loss, uncertainty, and limited resources, a dependable circle of support can help them continue their work without feeling that they must carry everything alone.
The PGH CARE Society traces its roots to a nurse-led support effort begun in 2015. What started as colleagues helping colleagues grew into a structured organization offering individual peer counseling, group debriefing, unit processing, and psychosocial support. Its members are nurses, led by UP alumni, who volunteer time, skills, and presence alongside their hospital responsibilities. Their shared experience gives the program its credibility because the person listening understands what it is like to work through a demanding shift while caring for patients and supporting families during difficult moments. Peer support does not replace professional mental health care when it is needed. Rather, it provides an accessible first point of connection and helps colleagues recognize when additional support may be appropriate.
Over the years, CARE Society has developed programs that respond to nurses at different stages of their professional journey. These programs provide opportunities for staff to pause, reflect, strengthen relationships, and reconnect with their sense of purpose. Other initiatives help newly hired nurses find their place, build supportive connections, and adjust more comfortably to the institution. Mindfulness and well-being activities offer practical ways to manage stress, while inclusive mental health programs ensure that every nurse feels safe, respected, and supported. Recognition initiatives also honor individuals and units whose everyday actions contribute to a healthier and more compassionate workplace.
The work also reaches nurses before a crisis occurs. From 2023 to 2025, CARE Society participated in onboarding activities for 393 newly hired nurses, introducing mental health support early in their PGH journey. In high-pressure areas such as operating rooms, post-anesthesia care, and specialty units, trained volunteers have facilitated debriefings and group processing after difficult events. These sessions allow teams to name what happened, understand their reactions, learn together, and identify when a colleague may need further help.
The COVID-19 pandemic tested this model at an unprecedented scale. Healthcare workers faced fear of infection, grief, isolation from their families, changing protocols, and exhausting workloads. Physical distance made traditional support harder at the very time it was most needed. Digital communication became an important bridge. It allowed CARE Society to sustain contact, coordinate volunteers, share mental health information, and create spaces for check-ins and psychosocial support. Online and blended learning also allowed peer-support knowledge to move beyond a single room or hospital schedule.
This experience shaped the CARE Society’s understanding of digital innovation. Connectivity is useful only when it improves access, trust, and timely action. A message can open the door, but a caring response helps a person step through it. An online session can bring participants together, but skilled facilitation makes the space safe. A digital resource can widen access to information, but people must still recognize distress, respond without judgment, and guide colleagues toward appropriate professional care when needed.
As the organization matured, its work moved from individual support toward systems change. In 2024, psychological safety was incorporated into the PGH Nursing Administrative Manual, helping place respectful communication, speaking up, and staff well-being within institutional practice. This milestone reflected a broader lesson from years of peer support: healthcare organizations cannot depend on personal resilience alone. They must create conditions in which workers can report concerns, learn from difficult experiences, and seek support without fear of shame or retaliation.
The PGH CARE Society has also shared its approach with communities beyond PGH. Its members have conducted learning sessions, psychosocial activities, and capacity-building programs with nurses, healthcare institutions, uniformed personnel, students, and community groups in Metro Manila and other parts of the country. Digital platforms have made it easier to maintain these partnerships, exchange resources, and connect volunteers with audiences separated by geography. Each partnership adapts the same principle to a new setting: support becomes sustainable when people within the community are equipped to care for one another.
In June 2026, the University of the Philippines conferred on the PGH CARE Society for Nurses the Gawad Pangulo para sa Natatanging Alumni during the Buwan ng Unibersidad. The award is the highest recognition given by the UP President to members of the UP community for outstanding contributions that advance the University’s mission. For CARE Society, the recognition honored years of volunteer service and the collective labor of nurses who kept showing up for their colleagues.
The journey toward the Gawad Pangulo was written long before the nomination documents were assembled. It was present in every confidential conversation, every debriefing after a difficult case, every learning session, every partnership, and every effort to make psychological safety part of hospital policy. The evidence submitted for the award told the story of a program that remained practical and responsive while steadily widening its reach. The recognition was received with gratitude, but also with a greater sense of responsibility. For CARE Society, being recognized by the University is not an endpoint. It is a call to continue serving nurses, healthcare workers, PGH, UP, and the Filipino people.
For UP alumni and alumni organizations, the Society’s experience offers one way of understanding what it means to give back to the University. Service does not always begin with a large fund, sophisticated technology, or an institution-wide project. It can begin with professional knowledge shared freely, a network opened to those who need it, or a system improved because alumni chose to stay involved. Digital tools can help organize that service and extend its reach, especially when distance, schedules, or limited resources would otherwise keep people apart.
The next chapter of the PGH CARE Society will continue to combine peer support, evidence, institutional partnership, and appropriate technology. Its aim is not to replace human presence with a screen. It is to use every available channel to make support easier to reach and harder to lose. For the nurses who care for the nation, that can mean receiving a timely reply, finding a safe space to speak, or simply knowing that someone will listen.
Beyond connectivity, this is what digital innovation can make possible: a community that responds, a workplace that learns, and a culture in which caring for the caregiver is recognized as part of caring for every patient.
