Fact-Checked Source : Romeo, I’m an ER doctor. The coronavirus is already overwhelming us.

A Washington Post Article detailing a day in the life on an ER doctor working in New York under these circumstances

Looking Deeper into the Article... Five Statements Fact-Checked 

To understand the article better we need to look at some statements in the article - 
 

My colleagues and I are trained to handle crisis situations. This is a different kind of test.

Emergency department physicians are trained to handle high-stress situations, but I have not seen a pandemic on this level, so I was curious to see how COVID-19 was being handled. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3299157/ This article proves the fact the physician burnout is prevalent in a large amount of ER doctors. 

But right now, we can’t do enough tests, and when we do test, we can’t get the results back fast enough.

This is true - the tests for COVID-19 aren't being handled quickly enough - https://www.michiganradio.org/post/michigans-covid-19-testing-lags-even-case-numbers-soar -This article lays into how even though Michigan is among the states with the highest cases in the USA, their testing capability has been hampered with slow outputs and low lab capacity to administer said tests. 

...the hospital rules change by the hour.

This one caught my attention fast - how are the rules changing? what's happening so quickly that the rules are changed hourly?https://www.medstarhealth.org/mhs/about-medstar/covid-19-info/visitor-restrictions-and-guidance-during-covid-19/ - This article from Medstar Health details some rules that have been changed/updated for COVID-19, but I'm not sure that these rules are changing hourly. They are changing, but not as often as one would think.

She asks if she can still travel, fearing she may lose her job if she doesn’t. I discourage her, explaining the importance of social distancing, though some of my own friends and family members have ignored these same concerns.

Many people have been asking if social distancing even works - some haven't been practicing it, instead protesting the 'dictator-like' orders to stay home. https://news.umich.edu/coronavirus-is-social-distancing-working/ - this news article by an associate professor of health management and policy at the University of Michigan School of Public Health states that YES, social distancing works and we need to practice it,  no matter what people try and say. 

 The surgeons are no longer seeing non-emergency patients at the bedside if they are being “ruled out” for the coronavirus. Too dangerous.

This is a small but frequently overlooked statement in the article for me  - if surgeons can't even come see patients to inform them of surgery related issues and answers, that will turn into a problem for everyone involved. However, it seems that this article from the US National Library of Medicine-National Institutes of Health states that "All known or suspected COVID-19-positive patients requiring surgical intervention must be treated as positive until proven otherwise in order to minimize infection spread."https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7137852/

 

Analytic Essay

Emotional & Physical Impacts COVID-19 has on Emergency Department Staff

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the world - shutting down small businesses, forcing many people to work from home, putting more people in the hospital than ever before, etc. Many people have it hard - but no one has it as hard as the workers in the emergency room. As the front line to the pandemic, they oversee the hardest hit patients before anyone else can in the hospital. They get case after case, and it’s beginning to take its toll on the staff. More ER staff are having to come in and work longer hours, which risks contracting COVID-19 themselves, and also could hamper work efficiency. 

ER doctors desperately need people to stay home and adhere to the social distancing guidelines - but it seems that the significant portion of the population is unaware of the effects that are having on society as a whole (such as in MI). Many teenagers (and adults) still go out in groups to hang out, seemingly unconscious of the fact that they can act as vectors for the virus. Due to this, there will be more infected at the end of the day, which leads to more cases that end up having to be hospitalized to treat. This potential increase in the number of cases could force a medical professional to have to deal with a greater workload, which could further decrease work productivity and increase the risk of infection and stress. Even in one day, ER staffers could use one room to treat at least three people with possible COVID-19 symptoms. 

Adding additional stress to an already intense environment could have negative effects on the mental health (emotional well-being) of the ER staffers. Studies show that even though ER staff are trained for high-stress situations, there is so much they can handle before mistakes and near misses are made, and patient satisfaction goes down. One study stated that “Burnout and its components were by far most frequently surveyed, followed by other affective symptoms such as depression, irritation, and psychological distress. PTSD and anxiety were less often examined. Patient- or task-related factors, e.g., workload, time pressure, violence, and traumatic events had adverse effects on affective symptoms and negative psychological functioning” (Schneider). 

To get people to practice social distancing and stay home is the end goal of every ER doctor - if only the very essential workers can come to work and travel, the curve would flatten, and the stay-at-home orders can be lifted. To get this message across to the whole country, however, is a more difficult task. To do that, hospitals turn to news outlets and share their ER staffers’ stories - how they, their families, and their coworkers have been affected by the virus. Some have been forced to send their children away, as Dr. Dara Kass described in an NPR article: “One of my first concerns when I knew this was happening...was that if I was going to be in the ER taking care of patients, I couldn't be in the same house as my child," Kass said.” 

Why should we care about the ER staffers’ perspective on COVID-19? Why shouldn’t we just listen to the WHO or the UN? When people come to the hospital, they usually come to the ER first, because they don’t know what’s wrong with them - they need to get treatment quickly. The ER is equipped for nearly everything. What hurts the staff, though, is their lack of knowledge on what’s wrong with the patient - they’re the first people to see the patient, so they have no idea what’s wrong with them. Once they have diagnosed the patient, then they can begin treatment. This whole time, they are interacting with the patient, physically touching the patient, and overall exposing themselves to the risk of infection. From a New York Times article, Dr. Angela Fusaro backs this: “Things that might be necessary to stabilize their lives are pretty intimate,” she said. “If you have to put in a breathing tube, you are going to be right up against them. You can’t practice that type of medicine from afar.” (Weise) Emergency room staff will always be on the frontlines, which can affect mood and mental health. We need our ER professionals to remain mentally and physically healthy if our system is to combat this virus, so staying home and practicing social distancing is the public’s best way to help ER staff and themselves.

References