"But until you see it first-hand, you have no idea what it's like, what it's going to be like."
Fighting a pandemic, a view from inside a southeast Michigan hospital: www.facebook.com/… *.
The nurse in this video delivers this information much more effectively than I can do through text alone; watch if you can. If not, a condensed version is below.
“It’s getting to the point now where we’re going to be just like Italy.”
Hospitals in Southeast Michigan are at or near capacity, with the numbers of people coming in doubling and tripling with each passing day. Most people are not being tested, especially those who are among the ‘walking well’...those people are being sent home to quarantine and isolate themselves from the rest of their families.
“We’re out of Tylenol, like, we’re out of Tylenol.”
Those that are staying at the hospital are there primarily for respiratory issues. If the patient’s condition is bad enough, they’ve been intubated...and hospitals have either have used or will soon use all available ventilators. Supplies of medications that keep a patient sedated while intubated like fentanyl or propofol are at or near the point of being exhausted. But that’s not all...
“Driving into work yesterday, we saw a lady in a car with a mask on and it was so nice that she could have a mask and we can’t.”
Hospital staff are given one N95 mask and a paper bag. At the end of their shift, the mask goes in the paper bag and the mask and bag are taken home to be reused the next day. Those masks normally are changed between patients. There are no spare masks, gowns, and supplies of gloves are running low.
If you do have resources that can be used, please consider donating them.
“We can’t stay safe and cannot care for all these people coming in because no one is taking this seriously.”
What’s happening now is that the staff at these hospitals will start making life and death decisions with regards to people’s care; if you go in, a determination will be made as to whether or not it’s an efficient use of resources to try and help you. If it isn’t, you’ll be sent back home to quarantine and die.
It’s not the role medical staff wants to play because most people going into medicine genuinely want to help as many people as possible and not decide who is going to live or die. Normally, if a patient passes, it’s because all options are exhausted and it was just the patient’s time to go. Now, because resources are so limited or nonexistent, the options are few and the exercising of them is not up to the patient.
“That’s it. That’s all we have.”
So stay home. Stay with your loved ones. Don’t go out, even for groceries unless it’s absolutely, critically necessary. Don’t go through drive-throughs. Limit contact beyond what you think is possible. Act like you’ve been infected. Don’t do anything that could put you at risk to have to go to a hospital for care, because as much as they want to and pains them not to, medical staff may have no way to do so.
“We’re in this together. We’re gonna fight this as hard as we can.”
*haven’t figured out how to embed a Facebook video, or if one can be embedded. will update if someone can assist with that. Thanks to Peregrine Kate for the assist with that one. Thought it was weird not to have an embed available.
Thursday, Mar 26, 2020 · 6:23:16 PM +00:00 · grape crush
UPDATE:
More news from Michigan:
"We're at the beginning of the curve — we're nowhere near the apex," Whitmer said in an interview on MSNBC. "And so it is a dire situation right now. That's why we're calling on our residents to do their part by staying at home."
Over the past week, Michigan has risen to become the state with the fifth-highest number of coronavirus cases, behind New York with more than 25,665 cases and 218 deaths, New Jersey, California and Washington state.
and
Many hospitals in Southeast Michigan, including eight-hospital Beaumont Health, have said they are nearly at bed capacity the past several days due to the surge in COVID-19 positive patients as the virus spreads through the community.
The article verifies what is being said about available beds and supplies, who is being impacted, and how hospitals are converting facilities and moving resources around to try and help as many people as possible.