CLEVELAND, Ohio — It is National Nurses Week — a yearly reminder of the commitment, hard work and compassion of nurses.

But this year, there's more to recognize as nurses are on the front lines battling the coronavirus.

For each and every one of us, throughout our lives, nurses are right there.

“I mean you have nurses to take care of people in the beginning of life, all the way to the end of life. And that's intimate and special,” said Ann Fiorta,  a nurse in a step down unit at MetroHealth Medical Center in Cleveland.

Nurses work long shifts on their feet. Sometimes missing holidays or milestone events to care for others.

Emily Pringle,  a 10-year veteran in the neonatal ICU at MetroHealth, says shes happy to do it.

“It's such a privilege, I think, to be given that opportunity to really come to people and be able to care for them when, when they need you, when, you know, they may not be a needy person in regular life, but now they found themselves in a hospital where they're dependent upon our skills and our knowledge to really like change the trajectory of what they're going through,” Pringle said.

Fiorta says nurses can be a lifeline for patients or family members on their worst days.

"So I find it the utmost privilege to be able to walk whatever path in life with a patient that I can and provide whatever kind of comfort care and compassion I can,” said Fiorta.

When COVID-19 hit the U.S., they began to tackle it head on.

“It gives us another opportunity to overcome that barrier of when, you know, now people are sick, they're having their worst days during a pandemic and they're scared and they're afraid and they're not sure about, you know, what kind of, what they're going to meet when they come into the hospital, and yet then we have the ability to meet them there and say, you know, we're going to care for you and we're going to give you our all,” said Pringle.

And as nurses, they say theyre built for it.

“Nurses are very resilient, there's, there's no way around, there's no other way to explain it. To be a nurse, you wear so many hats, and from the time i became a nurse 22 years ago, I can say that I've probably done every type of job within nursing that there is to do and then some,” said Fiorta.

When things get tough, nurses come together to support one another.

“We’re each other's socialization. We're just each other's core group to depend on, and I just think that you won't find teamwork like you find it in nursing and again this pandemic, I think, has just been a great opportunity to really highlight that — that we are just so in need of each other and we can just do such a better job when we work well together and nurses do, they just, they find the way to do it,” said Pringle.

Each year, National Nurses Week starts May 6 and ends on May 12, which is the birthday of British nurse and social reformer, Florence Nightingale, who is considered to be the founder of modern nursing.