Atlantic piece - “Headlines don’t capture the horror”

[2010houston]

Headlines Don’t Capture the Horror We Saw

I chronicled what COVID-19 did to a hospital. America must not let down its guard.

www.theatlantic.com

Written by an NYC Anesthesiology resident about the situation there in April. Well written and so sad.
@chocomorsel, weren’t you there around that time? Was this similar to your experiences?

Hope this doesn’t start happening again ; the numbers are not going in the right direction.

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[Southpaw]

Headlines Don’t Capture the Horror We Saw

I chronicled what COVID-19 did to a hospital. America must not let down its guard.

www.theatlantic.com

Written by an NYC Anesthesiology resident about the situation there in April. Well written and so sad.
@chocomorsel, weren’t you there around that time? Was this similar to your experiences?

Hope this doesn’t start happening again ; the numbers are not going in the right direction.

well I hope its not an indication of what's to come but I've started getting the recruiting emails again from NYC hospitals for 'covid surge'.

 

[Katheudontas parateroumen]

Wow heart wrenching stuff. Crazy to think how NYC became the epicenter of covid in the world. We were not prepared for it at all. Here in Houston TMC, I believe our cases rose up to the levels seen in NYC but it was later in the pandemic in July or so and the hospitalization rate was much lower but we were for a couple month above normal 100% ICU capacity. As a senior resident I was probably doing 2-3 covid intubations a night at one of our county hospitals. The stories from these covid times have been absolutely remarkable. From a hopefully once in a lifetime global pandemic that led to total shutdown, human stories of suffering and emotional bearing and empathy, to hopefully a warp speed vaccination... To be honest, this pandemic has made me proud to be a doctor again. The community rallying around healthcare workers, I feel that purpose again of when I first decided to do medicine at what seems to be ages ago.

 

[LineAndBerry]

A Sensible and Compassionate Anti-COVID Strategy - Imprimis (hillsdale.edu)

 

[Iso4ane]

A Sensible and Compassionate Anti-COVID Strategy - Imprimis (hillsdale.edu)

I think part of the problem is our 'lockdowns' up to this point have been half-assed. I know people who are stuck in China (only because the US won't let them in), but daily life there is closer to prepandemic levels, than where we are here.

 

[chocomorsel]

Headlines Don’t Capture the Horror We Saw

I chronicled what COVID-19 did to a hospital. America must not let down its guard.

www.theatlantic.com

Written by an NYC Anesthesiology resident about the situation there in April. Well written and so sad.
@chocomorsel, weren’t you there around that time? Was this similar to your experiences?

Hope this doesn’t start happening again ; the numbers are not going in the right direction.

That was also a time when too many people were getting intubated prematurely.
I was not in NYC. I was in a suburb. We never ran out of beds and we had the Anesthesia department in charge of the intubations. I never saw more than three to five intubations a day, and probably the same if not more codes a day. My hospital I think was smaller one with one 20 bed MICU that ended up adding four units.

Currently where I go, it is getting bad. I think Albuquerque is at NYC level bad at the university. Not where I currently am at, but that's because we have a brand new hospital building. We are however lacking in nursing staff and I feel like elective surgeries should stop again. But that is not my call.

 

[GassYous]

I was there. Can confirm these stories. Airways every hour is very accurate. At the height of the pandemic, we were going from unit to unit because there were too many airways and some at the same time, including pediatrics. Spending all day and night tubing and lining was a given. I intubated several of our physicians including a chief of a department. We didn't sit at bedside though, they paid nurses and doctors from other states several thousands a week to do that.

We prepared our ORs for covid patients but decided that the infrastructure for existing units was better, especially in terms of getting medications there and to save our ORs if we needed them. But we blocked a bunch of them off.

There were extra doctors from outpatient clinics and many surgical attendings and medicine residents stepped up to provide care for the covid units. But the really amazing thing was the nurses. It's amazing how motivated and helpful non-NY state nurses are. I remember having an ob patient brought to the OR for section with 4 of our OB nurses just milling around doing nothing while the traveler nurse was helping me with transfer to the bed and putting on monitors. Now I realize that being helpful and doing your job is standard behavior outside of the city.

I had two patients code on induction and intubation. It is terrifying to be doing chest compressions on a guy who was talking to you 5 minutes ago, even with a sat of 70. I did the compressions. I pushed the epi. Most people were too scared to come in the room. Both of them died. Most of them died. One of the most depressing times of my life. The flippant chatter about how masks are a liberal gates foundation sheeple plot is really hard to bear and the fact that the country learned absolutely nothing from our sacrifice. Still no ppe, still idiots driving their trucks around screaming about how masks are fascism, still unscrupulous companies trying to make billions by peddling their expensive drugs that don't do ****. We were using decadron from the beginning but nothing else works.

 

[MirrorTodd]

I was there. Can confirm these stories. Airways every hour is very accurate. At the height of the pandemic, we were going from unit to unit because there were too many airways and some at the same time, including pediatrics. Spending all day and night tubing and lining was a given. I intubated several of our physicians including a chief of a department. We didn't sit at bedside though, they paid nurses and doctors from other states several thousands a week to do that.

We prepared our ORs for covid patients but decided that the infrastructure for existing units was better, especially in terms of getting medications there and to save our ORs if we needed them. But we blocked a bunch of them off.

There were extra doctors from outpatient clinics and many surgical attendings and medicine residents stepped up to provide care for the covid units. But the really amazing thing was the nurses. It's amazing how motivated and helpful non-NY state nurses are. I remember having an ob patient brought to the OR for section with 4 of our OB nurses just milling around doing nothing while the traveler nurse was helping me with transfer to the bed and putting on monitors. Now I realize that being helpful and doing your job is standard behavior outside of the city.

I had two patients code on induction and intubation. It is terrifying to be doing chest compressions on a guy who was talking to you 5 minutes ago, even with a sat of 70. I did the compressions. I pushed the epi. Most people were too scared to come in the room. Both of them died. Most of them died. One of the most depressing times of my life. The flippant chatter about how masks are a liberal gates foundation sheeple plot is really hard to bear and the fact that the country learned absolutely nothing from our sacrifice. Still no ppe, still idiots driving their trucks around screaming about how masks are fascism, still unscrupulous companies trying to make billions by peddling their expensive drugs that don't do ****. We were using decadron from the beginning but nothing else works.

Feels like that's the truth outside of academia. Every private place I've rotated through has been a dream. People are helpful, I've had an circulator bring me an OR jacket because she saw me wearing a blanket! That **** sure as **** wouldn't happen at my main military hospital. I can bring a patient in the room and go grab my airway stuff and start the chart and the other people in the room actually help the pt move to the OR bed and they put on monitors, they set up the bair hugger. If I need something, a drug from the main core or whatever, all I have to do is ask and they don't ignore me. It's ****ing mind boggling just how crappy my hospital in academia is run. Even the techs are ****. Like we'll frequently have to set up our a-line pressure bags, we'll even have to turn over the anesthesia machines between cases occassionaly. Like it's redonk just how huge of a difference it is on the outside.

 

[Katheudontas parateroumen]

Yes I did not realize how much different it was from private to academic. Within one of the hospitals I rotate at, there’s a “private” side and an academic side. On the private side, the OR nurse rarely every give me any push back for anything I ask, help hold the mask for preoxygenation, start a second IV, do all the positioning/tucking/flipoing, got me a chair to sit. Like wow I feel like a second class citizen again when I’m back to the teaching side.