Class of 2020 reflects on impact of COVID-19 pandemic

The future looked very different at the dawn of the year.

Fourth-year medical students anticipated their residency matches, a celebratory commencement ceremony and long-planned vacations. Graduate School of Nursing students were wrapping up research projects and advancing their clinical practice. Doctoral candidates in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences were preparing to defend their dissertations and enter a job market brimming with possibilities.

In March 2020, everything changed after a novel coronavirus, first reported in Wuhan, China, raced across continents, causing a global pandemic of severe respiratory infection that was named COVID-19.

UMass Medical School students planning to graduate in May were on the forefront of the pandemic’s impact, facing disruptions in their personal lives while responding to the need to bring their talents to the fight.

Moving the traditional Match Day celebration to an online event in early March heralded the first of many changes. Then on March 31, the School of Medicine became the first medical school in the country to graduate students two months early, working with state licensing authorities to bring a surge of new physicians to treat patients.

Uncertainty, but also opportunities to serve, learn and grow marked the capstone to graduates’ academic careers.

“Your medical education doesn’t stop the day you come across the commencement stage,” Chancellor Michael F. Collins said.

Despite disruptions caused by the pandemic, Chancellor Collins said, “Our students were up to the task, whatever the task was they were doing.”

School of Medicine

“Never before have we needed you more to join our ranks as healers and leaders of health care teams,” School of Medicine Dean Terence R. Flotte told graduates in his remarks at the school’s virtual commencement on March 31. “Yours is a vocation, a calling, to serve your fellow human beings in their moments of greatest need.”

Shruthi Srinivas, MD’20, had been planning a two-week vacation abroad, weekends in Maine, weddings and to attend her younger brother’s college graduation before starting her residency in general surgery at Ohio State University.

Instead, Dr. Srinivas joined the surge corps of new physicians in April and was assigned to a COVID intensive care unit at UMass Memorial Medical Center.

“It was a very steep learning curve, treating patients with a disease that we don’t know anything about,” Srinivas said.

Her role included calling patients’ families to give them updates on loved ones they hadn’t seen in days or weeks. While it was a daunting task, she knew that she had practiced as a medical student on standardized patients, in front of her peers and on video, which gave her confidence.

“I think the biggest thing UMass Medical School taught me is that I’m capable of doing things,” Srinivas said. “When I was a medical student, I learned how to take on challenges, when to ask for help and when to figure things out on my own, which now as a provider for patients, is a very useful skill.”

Patrick Lowe, MD, PhD’20, also jumped into the fray, helping bring outpatient telehealth quickly up to speed and joining the physician surge corps, a far cry from his plans to take a break after eight years of graduate school to golf and spend time with his family, including his 6-month-old son.

Dr. Lowe matched in emergency medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

“The reality just shifted,” Lowe said. “I didn’t expect to be working as a quasi-intern so quickly, but it was a seamless transition.”

In the hospital, Lowe was assigned to a general medicine unit at UMass Memorial, freeing up other physicians for COVID care. He then worked on a COVID unit with former classmates, providing support to attending physicians by writing notes, doing orders and communicating with families.

“I’ve gotten a great amount of education just in this last month or so,” Lowe said in May. “And with respect to COVID, I see that even in a hospital with all these resources, things can change pretty quickly, so that’s an important lesson.”

Grant Lewandrowski, MD’20, put his self-designed emergency, disaster and tactical medicine elective and U.S. Marine Corps training to use to help set up the Worcester DCU Center field hospital in April, working with Blake Foster, SOM ’21. The field hospital was designed to treat less-seriously ill COVID patients, leaving hospital resources for those who were critically ill.

Dr. Lewandrowski matched with UMass Medical School in family medicine and will be doing his outpatient work at UMass Memorial Medical Center’s Barre Family Health Center.

Responding to the COVID-19 crisis “definitely altered” his career, he said.

“I went into family medicine because I love the flexibility of the field and also, I’ve become a true believer who thinks primary care is the way to fix our health care system,” Lewandrowski said. “But I also want to see if there is a niche I can carve out where I’m a family medicine guy, but on the side, I do disaster medicine plans.”

Lewandrowski was not able to participate in the surge corps, which, as with some others who were unable or chose not to volunteer, left him with “a little survivor’s guilt,” he said. “Fortunately, I was able to find a way to contribute, even though it wasn’t direct hands-on patient care.”

Heather Reiley, MD’20, found a different way to serve before leaving for her residency in pediatrics at Maine Medical Center. She signed on with the nonprofit Partners in Health to be a contact investigator, conducting contact tracing interviews remotely for COVID cases referred each day by the state Department of Public Health.

Dr. Reiley had finished a fifth year of medical school in December, following a global health experience abroad the previous spring, and was on a graduation trip to New Zealand when the pandemic erupted. She was at Los Angeles International Airport, returning home, when she read the email that the traditional Match Day celebration was canceled.

“I thought it would be a good use of my time and also a good experience to learn how contact tracing works,” said Reiley.

Speaking with COVID-19 patients was emotionally difficult at times, she said. Low-income communities were hit hard and many of those affected did not have a primary care provider, lived in crowded homes, or wouldn’t be paid if they didn’t go to work.

“But mostly, it was just trying to make that human connection,” she said. “I’m definitely well prepared for this role because at UMass Medical School, the strength is teaching us how to do interviews and work with patients.”

The experience, said Reiley, “reinforced the importance of public health,” which she hopes to incorporate into her career.

I have a sense of excitement, to be part of the health care system and contribute to treating patients and helping people through difficult times like this.

ANDREW EL-HAYEK, MD’20

“Sadness is not a zero-sum game,” Andrew El-Hayek, MD’20, told his classmates in his virtual commencement speech. “We can acknowledge the gravity and true tragedy this pandemic represents with respect to human lives lost, while also having room to mourn the losses we have endured.”

Dr. El-Hayek, who matched in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said he regretted not having the chance to celebrate with his class and spend a few weeks traveling.

He settled into his apartment in Boston with his significant other, classmate Danielle Iskandar, MD’20, who matched at Massachusetts General Hospital in pediatrics and did “a mish-mash” of volunteer activities.

Having been a peer mentor in medical school, El-Hayek worked on a teaching module to prepare rising third-year students for clinical work; conducted chart reviews for a study on stratifying COVID patient risk; and made mental health support calls with a human services agency.

He reflected on how lucky he was to have been in medical school at the start of this global crisis and to be able to understand as much about it as is known.

El-Hayek said, “The things that have been challenging are more inconveniences. And I have a sense of excitement, to be part of the health care system and contribute to treating patients and helping people through difficult times like this.”

I never thought a mask would be so sacred. It’s almost a lifeline, to be able to have human connection and go outside.

ASHLEY MATTHEW, MD, PhD’20

Ashley Matthew, MD, PhD’20, wanted to become a physician-scientist to give back by taking care of patients and making lasting impacts that will help patients for generations.

It was a family affair. She and her twin sister, Asia Matthew-Onabanjo, went to college together and entered the UMMS MD/ PhD program together. Matthew-Onabanjo anticipates finishing her studies in 2021.

Dr. Matthew, who received two Chancellor’s Awards—in the School of Medicine and Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences—looked forward to spending time with her family and traveling abroad after finishing her degrees in March.

COVID crushed her travel plans.

“But a big part of this time for me was really prioritizing my family, and that’s what I did,” Matthew said. It would be the last time family members could be together before she headed to Virginia Commonwealth University, where she matched in urology.

Matthew also helped with chart reviews to develop a COVID database.

“I think the virus showed us we’re not prepared for a situation like this, in terms of resources,” she said.

The shortage and importance of PPE particularly opened her eyes.

“I never thought a mask would be so sacred. It’s almost a lifeline, to be able to have human connection and go outside,” Matthew said.

The pandemic’s silver lining for Matthew was, “While it’s not what we hoped for, there are other things that you’re able to do, which you wouldn’t have done without this little break in time.”

Graduate School of Nursing

If we want people to understand why we’re asking them to stand six feet away from each other and wear masks and limit contact with their families and friends, we need to do a really good job of explaining it.

JOANNE LEWIS, PhD’20, ACNP-BC

Joanne Lewis, PhD’20, ACNP-BC, worked as a nurse practitioner in UMass Memorial’s general surgery department, pursuing her PhD in nursing to study better ways to manage pain and reduce opioid use after surgery. Her dissertation, which she defended over Zoom, featured a feasibility study of a patient video intervention.

Dr. Lewis planned to continue doing research alongside her clinical work.

“But with COVID, everything is different,” she said. “A lot of Institutional Review Board stuff is put on hold so you can’t bring new patients in for studies right now. Everything kind of just stopped.”

The changes scared Lewis a little. “I think I am much more needed clinically in the short term,” she said. “I need to put some of the research on the back burner. But at the same time, I know how important it is, especially now.”

Lewis said some important research projects could come out of the COVID-19 crisis, such as exploring the wide differences in how people feel about preventive measures. “If we want people to understand why we’re asking them to stand six feet away from each other and wear masks and limit contact with their families and friends, we need to do a really good job of explaining it,” she said.

Adam Bliss, DNP’20, said his ethical code was strengthened along with his leadership skills as he worked with Erik Garcia, MD, assistant professor of family medicine & community health, to support Worcester’s homeless population during the pandemic.

Dr. Bliss received the Chancellor’s Award at the GSN commencement on May 31.

Bliss had been working with Family Health Center of Worcester’s Homeless Outreach and Advocacy Program after becoming a nurse practitioner in August 2019, helping people with addiction, primary care and mental health services.

After Gov. Charlie Baker ordered no more than 25 people in a building space, in mid-March, Bliss became alarmed. “The shelter system in Worcester is very overcrowded,” he said. The Queen Street SMOC Shelter has 25 to 30 beds but sees 130 people a night. “There’s no way to distance with that much crowding.”

Bliss worked with city officials to open three additional satellite shelters to spread people out and co-led with Dr. Garcia a team to open a medical shelter at Worcester Technical High School. The shelter later moved to the DCU field hospital.

“We found a lot of our patients were asymptomatically infected and would have continued to infect other residents at the shelter. It made me value even more the population I was working with,” said Bliss, who no longer takes having a safe, comfortable home for granted. “And it also made me realize how vulnerable my population is.”

“COVID-19 impacted the class of 2020 as many of them were caring for these infected patients or other patients and had the added stresses of social isolation and fear of infecting their friends and family,” said GSN Dean Joan Vitello. “In addition, they had scholarly projects to complete and to present. Despite these significant challenges all of them overcame their individual hurdles to successfully graduate. We are so very proud of them.”

Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences

“It’s like everything turned upside down,” said Mona Motwani, PhD’20.

Dr. Motwani, who received the GSBS Dean’s Award, worked over the years in “a race against time” on a competitive autoimmune and inflammatory diseases study, in the lab of Katherine A. Fitzgerald, PhD, the Worcester Foundation for Biomedical Research Chair, professor of medicine, vice chair for research in the Department of Medicine and director of the Program in Innate Immunity.

Motwani started looking for industry jobs in January and received several offers, which she rejected because they weren’t quite the right fit. When businesses started shutting down, she got nervous.

Ultimately, her plans worked out. A few weeks later, she accepted a position as a senior scientist at the pharmaceutical firm Sanofi. But Motwani said the shutdowns and hiring freezes surrounding the global pandemic “shook my confidence a little bit.”

Motwani was the first in her department to defend her dissertation online over Zoom, an experience her chairman practiced along with her to work out logistics.

She was disappointed that her parents in India couldn’t share her celebratory moments in person, but she sent them video clips. She also missed being able to thank in person her mentors and all the people “who directly built this community around me.”

Motwani said, “It’s very humbling that we tend to think months and years ahead and we’ve tried to plan our lives. But one thing can just change everything and have a trickle-down effect on so many different levels.”

Gordon Lockbaum, PhD’20, also defended online his thesis on structure-based drug design in viral proteases, which he worked on with Celia Schiffer, PhD, the Gladys Smith Martin Chair in Oncology, professor of biochemistry & molecular pharmacology, and director of the Institute for Drug Resistance at UMMS.

His work was hindered when campus largely shut down and he couldn’t work in the lab. All nonessential graduate students were barred from the lab unless they petitioned for early re-entry.

Dr. Lockbaum entered the industry job market just as corporate hiring freezes and cessation of networking events caused by the pandemic upended that path.

Instead, he accepted a postdoctorate position in the Schiffer lab, researching inhibiting the two viral proteases that coronavirus has. Lockbaum said he was grateful for the opportunity to continue working with his mentor, but plans to explore industry again as the job market settles.

“I assumed that I would finish up, I would get some job interviews and offers, and, you know, start my life,” Lockbaum said. “But things have changed.”

GSBS Dean Mary Ellen Lane said at commencement on May 31, “While many of us will never have a direct role in neutralizing coronavirus, or treating COVID-19 patients, or ensuring that care and treatment are distributed equitably, we all have a role to play in holding ourselves, our families, our communities together as we face this uncertain future, in pushing through paralyzing grief and fear to figure out how to do the things that we never thought could be done.”

“We’ve seen that preparedness is important. We’ve seen the ability to care is important. We’ve seen the ability to create treatments is important,” Chancellor Collins said about the impact of the pandemic on the Medical School community. “And we’re learning in real time.” ■

By Susan E.W. Spencer