FEATURE

BEHIND

A look into what it is like working on the frontlines of COVID-19. MASKTHE

By Molly Balison

Editor-in-Chief

Exhausted from traveling, the emergency medicine physician, Tricia Dickens, roamed the El Paso International airport. She was surrounded by individuals suited up in masks who were booking flights to escape COVID-19. The reality of how severe the pandemic was in this city hit her. As a traveling physician, she wanted to go where she was most needed--and for the next several weeks, it would be El Paso,Texas. Since 2017, Dickens has been a traveling physician licensed in emergency medicine in 6 states. As COVID-19 spread rapidly and hospitals overflowed, Dickens was assigned to cities across the country whose health care facilities desperately needed extra hands. The national shortage of healthcare professionals to attend to the abundance of patients entering the hospitals was so urgent that Dickens was flown out to states that she didn’t even have a license in such as New York, Arizona, and Texas. There was no time to waste applying for a license in the middle of a crisis. An average day in Dickens’ life is intense. Just reviewing each patient’s condition with the nurses would take her up to half the day. The rest of her day is filled with completing procedures that need to be done. “There’s no idle time” Dickens said,“I’m either working, eating, or sleeping” Dickens works anywhere from 6 to 12 “shifts” throughout the year, with each shift being several weeks long.

It is nearing 10 months since the first pandemic hit the United States, yet it is still too early to identify the patterns of the Coronavirus. Viruses are complicated and unpredictable. This has been a source of anxiety for people across the nation. “Our society is so used to immediate answers to everything, that uncertainty...doesn’t feel good.” Dickens said.

Even physicians do not fully understand the extent of the virus as they have been bombarded with so much new information in such a short period of time. Dickens made a point that the public needs to be patient and understanding with health care professionals since they are still figuring out how to overcome the pandemic. “We don’t come across something completely novel and know exactly how it all works.” Dickens emphasized, “We have to have experience with it first.”

What is different about the Coronavirus is that it impacts other organ systems besides the respiratory

system even in patients with no preexisting medical conditions. Dickens explained, “It’s amazing to me that this is a respiratory virus…This one is creating a blood issue so it’s not just a respiratory issue. That includes the clotting system and the inflammatory system in our body and creates significant issues in our other organs that are not typically affected by a respiratory infection.” This aspect of the novel virus has been eye opening to physicians who have never encountered something like it before. “I have a respect for the virus that I think a lot of people who haven’t experienced a loved one that became ill with it would have no concept of” Dickens said. She stands by patients’ sides and watches their health rise and fall in hopes that everything she has done to care for them is enough to save their lives. “That’s very rewarding to watch someone on the brink of death and watch them improve.” Dickens said, “It’s a feeling that you just never forget”

“Our society is so used to immediate answers to everything, that uncertainty...doesn’t feel good.” -Tricia Dickens