We had a patient who looked like she was close to being able to come off the ventilator. There were plans to extubate her the next day. She was improving, then suddenly she nose-dived. Ruled out everything else and decided this must be cytokine storm. Her kidneys were completely shot, she had to go on dialysis. She died about a week later. I can’t stop thinking about what her middle school aged children must have been going through…one day their mom was being discharged from the field hospital because she didn’t need respiratory support, the next she went to the hospital and never came back.
As a nurse I don’t usually tell families when their loved one has died because they are either 1) at the bedside or 2) the provider calls. Sometimes I happen to catch them as they are returning from a quick trip to the cafeteria and their family member passed quickly but that’s few and far between.
But I will never forget having to tell my patient’s daughter that he had died, surrounded by me and a family medicine doctor (a PCP! On a stepdown unit!) and a respiratory therapist, only 48 hours after his wife had also passed from covid.
I will never forget arranging the visitation times of another patient who was dying NOT OF COVID, and we could only allow 2 people at a time. Please remember that covid is terrible and it kills people in a horrific way, causes unknown long term damage in many, and spreads like wildfire…. but E V E R Y O N E is suffering because of this pandemic regardless of whether you get it or not. And the longer we continue to refuse to wear masks or appropriately socially distance, the longer that every single person in this country suffers.
