Sarah Koerber, a nurse in the intensive care unit at Lafayette General Medical Center, has seen her parents three times since mid-March. She hugged them once.
She told them last week to stay at the cabin in West Virginia, where they had been on vacation for a month because returning to their home in South Louisiana was too dangerous.
It is not just because they are at high risk of complications from the new coronavirus. It is because they are in danger of having no one to take care of them if they require hospitalization for any other reason.
“The reality of the healthcare system right now is that, because of the number of Covid patients we have, the hospital cannot handle any other illnesses or diseases that may occur,” said Koerber. “If my father had a heart attack tomorrow, and he needed open heart surgery, if he went to the Lafayette General emergency room, there is a very good chance that he cannot stay there for heart surgery. If he is lucky, he It can be sent to Heart Hospital. If it is not, it can be sent out of state. I don’t even know if we could handle broken bones right now. That’s the situation we are in. “
Coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continue to decline in Acadiana, as deaths continue to rise with no signs of slowing down.
The problem is not so much the space as the staff. And it does not seem that the situation will improve soon.
As of Monday morning, a total of 181 employees have tested positive for coronavirus on the hospital’s main campus. It represents approximately 6% of the 2,800 employees who work for Lafayette General. Employees are evaluated if they are symptomatic, not at a general level, according to hospital spokeswoman Patricia Thompson.
The total number is not as worrisome as the rate of new cases among employees, which Thompson said is the result of the spread of the community at large. Two months ago, only 20 employees had tested positive for the virus. A month ago, the total number of employees was 40. Now, the number has grown to almost 200.
It has put more pressure on already tense staff.
“We are working with personnel agencies and we have very dedicated nurses who work overtime and overtime,” said Thompson. “We know, dedicated as they are, that the level of intensity is not sustainable. We continue to beg the community to follow the mask mandate and the guidelines for social distancing.”
No matter how serious the new coronavirus is considered, it is not disputed that the pandemic is draining hospitals in communities …
Thompson said hospital administrators are cautiously optimistic that coronavirus cases are stagnating in Acadiana, as there has been no increase in patients in a few days.
Still, there is growing frustration among local medical professionals about how the community is responding to the state’s mask mandate and the second wave of coronavirus cases in Acadiana.
Koerber has been silent on social media about what he has seen in the hospital since the pandemic began. It was a viral video claiming that doctors ignore a known cure for COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, that inspired him to write a candid post about what’s really going on.
“I think lately, hopefully a minority and not a majority, we’ve felt less supported,” said Koerber. “We feel very inundated and bombarded by the Covid level and then there are people who disagree on whether it is real or a hoax or a political or conspiracy issue.”
His Wednesday post has been circulating locally on Facebook, as has another passionate post: a letter sent by the medical director of Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center to hospital staff.
Earlier this spring, Louisiana officials spent millions of dollars purchasing fans and PPE and building a facility …
Although Dr. Henry Kaufman IV did not intend for the letter to be made public, Lourdes officials have confirmed its authenticity.
Kaufman said the number of Covid patients soared Monday morning to 82, and that admissions continue to outpace highs. More nurses and team members get sick every day, she said.
“I have no reason to believe that this wave of cases will diminish anytime soon and I anticipate that we will continue to serve large numbers of COVID + patients for the foreseeable future,” he wrote. “As a result, I’m afraid the recent history of cases will drain our community’s medical resources.”
Kaufman pleaded in the letter to hospital staff that he may not be treating Covid patients firsthand to take the crisis seriously and make sure his friends and family are doing the same.
“Every day I face people in our community who believe that the pandemic is a hoax, that it is politically motivated, that things are not as bad as the media portray,” Kaufman wrote. “If anyone doubts it, I invite you to accompany me personally on a tour of our intensive care unit (ICU) and COVID units. There you can see for yourself the patients in their second, third and fourth decades of life with minimal or no comorbid conditions struggling to breathe in the ICU along with those we would expect to be most affected by the disease. This disease is NOT affecting only those with significant medical comorbidities. “
Kaufman also wrote that for schools to open responsibly, “hospitals must have a reasonable capacity to cope with the increase in cases that will follow the return of children to school.”
The teams work shift after shift with little rest, according to Lourdes spokeswoman Elisabeth Arnold. The hospital administration is providing meals, washing scrubs, subsidizing child care, and praying with employees.
However, community support will be needed to help medical professionals survive the pandemic.
“Where other places have allowed science and reason to guide their actions, the curve has flattened and the disease has been suppressed to the point where routine personal and commercial activities have resumed,” Kaufman wrote. “Here in our community, there has been a lot of resistance to common sense measures and we are reaping the rewards of our stubbornness.”
On Tuesday, July 21, 2020, General Lafayette Medical Center had a record number of 105 patients with Covid-19. These are photos taken for two hours …
Even though morale is low and employees are exhausted, Koerber said he has witnessed so many beautiful moments for his team at Lafayette General.
Nurses have decorated a patient’s room with Star Wars images and gone to the store to buy watermelon at the patient’s request. They have cried alongside patients who cannot see their families, and have encouraged patients who were discharged after months in the hospital.
His colleagues have become his support system.
Koerber said the community seemed to support his efforts until Easter, but support has steadily declined since then.
“People just get over it,” he said. “But healthcare workers have gotten over it, too. We would all like Covid to be done and a thing of the past, and we are not here yet.”
Kaufman ended his letter with a directive for staff.
“We all went to medicine for a sense of the common good, to heal the sick and alleviate suffering,” Kaufman wrote to his staff. “Currently our community is sick, the disease is ignorance and misinformation, and you, my colleagues, are the cure. The patient requires your attention. Take action.”
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