They left the care, but Corona brought them back. “Is it sensible, Henk?”

Due to the crown crisis, something unique is happening in the healthcare sector: Approximately twenty thousand (former) healthcare workers have already indicated that they want to help now that the pressure on hospitals is very high. The Extrahandsvoordezorg government office reports that it links these people to places where help is needed. Some of the people who report are retired or changed jobs before. Others continue to work as health workers, but now want to help in areas most severely affected by the coronavirus outbreak.

Almost three hundred care organizations have already requested support at the counter. In total for almost four thousand full-time jobs.

Also read this story of IC doctors in Assen and Amsterdam: “Most people think: someone will solve it”

Nurses and doctors can also return to work as long as they have a valid BIG record. The government has expanded that policy, so nurses whose BIG had expired after January 1 can now return to work.

Three former care workers who return to their old hospitals after months, sometimes even years, explain why they do this.

Henk Feijs (66 years old) works again at the Zuyderland Hospital in Heerlen

“Is it wise, Henk?” Most of the colleagues reacted happily when Feijs was back in front of them. But some raised their eyebrows anxiously. Start working in a crown war zone at your age?

Feijs himself also had doubts. Damn, should I? He had seen the influx of crown patients grow at the Limburg hospital. The intensive care unit where he had worked for forty years was filling up. A second IC department has already been created. He knew how good it is to have extra hands when he’s busy.

Last June was his last business day. That morning he had just gone to work: his family picked him up in the morning. First “coffee, tea, custard” [vlaai]. At night, a party with one hundred and ten guests. “Unforgettable,” said Feijs.

On his first day of intensive care work, he was only 24 years old. At that time, the hospital was still called De Wever Hospital. Intensive therapy was an interesting place, because “every disease you can think of” passes through there.

What has always fascinated him is how bodies react so differently to ailment. Some people only catch a cold from the coronavirus, others die. How is that possible? Feijs thinks. The same was true for the flu. “I have seen many people die from something basic, like appendicitis.”

Ventilating people, that’s what Feijs did forty-two years ago, but at the time it was still a special feature. The device at that time had a hose that Feijs had to put into the water to get the correct pressure. Machines now understand how much pressure it takes to get enough air into a patient’s lungs.

It is far from the first time that Feijs faces a new disease. For example, there were young children with the meningococcal bacteria years ago. He also remembers AIDS patients well, at that time he had to be careful not to prick his fingers with syringes. Q fever also played in his region. And now for the corona virus. “I’ve never experienced that in my life: such an influx, at a time of nothing.”

Patients with the virus are “very sick people,” he sees. “Sometimes they come in talking, a few hours later they lie on their stomachs, on a respirator, dead and deadly sick.”

After returning to work, another doctor in the intensive care unit fell ill. He made the right decision, Feijs thought.

He explains to his colleagues that he has come under certain conditions. He works three days a week. “It must be safe. If there is no protective clothing, it ends for me.”

Fortunately, he is healthy. Exercise regularly, cycle, “time is short.” No, he could not have discovered the black hole after his removal. He immediately launched into the restaurant business he has with his wife. Cook, serve – at weddings, personal parties, communions.

It was a strange feeling to put on his white coat again last week. “If you had told me last year: you will be back in the hospital in a few months, I would have said: you are crazy. No one could have foreseen this.

Marissa Meulstee (32 years old), works again at UMC Utrecht

A series of hospitals on Net5 gave Marissa Meulstee the idea of ​​becoming a nurse. She was nineteen years old when she graduated as a nurse. Meulstee joined the head and neck oncology department at UMC Utrecht. She thought it was fantastic, but also intense. She calls it a “crash course while growing up.” Tumors in the maxillary sinuses, throat, nose. Very drastic operations. She worked in the department for a total of eight years, with an intermediate step as a district nurse.

After Meulstee gave birth to twins, the irregular hours were interrupted. She and her husband sought more structure for the young family. Friends were starting a catering business in their hometown of Harderwijk. Meulstee brainstormed with them on the terrace. Why didn’t you join the company? They asked. At first, Meulstee laughed: giving up his good job at UMC Utrecht? But the idea kept gnawing.

She is now a co-owner and certified barista. In the “nice and cozy dining room” they have, he went to the cafe. In search of inspiration, he traveled the country to try coffee in bars. “In our case I also take care of people, but in very different circumstances.”

Jemig, what forms will it take, Meulstee thought when Prime Minister Mark Rutte announced at a press conference that people should work from home whenever possible. In Spain, the catering industry was already closed, the same threatened for the Netherlands. Meulstee had been out of care for three years, but something started to itch again.

At the same time, there were also doubts. I could still do it, is it safe to start again after years? The personnel and organization department eventually placed her in the middle care department, a nursing department for patients with and without a crown. During the first shift it was again as before. He dialed the reception number without thinking. “He just left. Very strange.

She is now supervised by another nurse. She meets former colleagues in the hallway. “Thanks for doing this,” they say.

In her protective clothing by the bedside of a Covid-19 patient, Meulstee feels safer than at the supermarket. The risk of infection doesn’t impress her as much. The loneliness of the patients. How some people die alone. And how an old couple is formed so that they are together during the last hours.

She does this job as long as her catering business is closed. Then see if you can hold another shift during the week. “Then I’ll see how it is here.”

Wim Togni (64 years old) works again at the OLVG in Amsterdam

Wim Togni still had the email address of his former manager. He appeared at eight in the afternoon on Monday, March 23. He received a reply at nine o’clock. On Tuesday, a pass and a six-hour zero-hour contract were available. On Wednesday he returned to the OLVG department in Amsterdam, where he had worked for 34 years.

After his early retirement, Togni had moved from the North Holland Landsmeer to the village of Doorwerth near Arnhem. At the local castle he did volunteer work behind the cash register. I wanted to do something completely unrelated to medical care. People who come to the castle are hiking, he says. No one goes to the hospital for fun.

On television, Togni had watched the intensive care units fill up. Then it will be the turn of the OLVG, he thought. He didn’t really think about his own risk of infection. He was already in danger: his wife also works in the hospital. The couple stays away from their daughter-in-law, who is twelve weeks pregnant. Until the crisis ends.

Togni had been away for two years, but soon returned to the department as if it had never been otherwise. I still knew most of the people. New employees knew him by name. This was because Togni had a dual role in the hospital before his departure. Reviewed the IC department team. In the years after his departure, the room in which he did so was still called “Wim’s loft.”

Now your knowledge of the various new respirators is helpful. First there were 24 beds in the ICU, now 59. They even got eight devices from the army.

Togni was already familiar with other infectious diseases of the past in a ‘moon suit’. But with the crown it is more intensive, patient room after patient room. It is hot in the suit and you have stretch marks on your face. You can’t do anything about it, it’s no different.

Corona makes an impression, but it is not the most violent he has experienced in the department. That was New Year’s morning in 2001, after the Volendam disaster. Happily he had gone to bed partying and returned to the apartment at three in the morning. One burned teenager after another was driven. But unlike Corona, peace returned after a day or two or three.

Togni now gets up at five thirty four days a week. At six o’clock it leads to Amsterdam. He returns home twelve hours later. He’ll stay, he thinks, as long as it’s necessary. “I’ve been through that now. So I want to finish it too.