KEVON FELMINE
kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

"Nur­sie, I could video call my rel­a­tive?” a 26-year-old pa­tient asked as he lay at the In­ten­sive Care Unit (ICU) of the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal and Mul­ti-Train­ing Fa­cil­i­ty.

He was un­der­go­ing oxy­gen ther­a­py with a non-re­breather mask, al­ter­nat­ing with Con­tin­u­ous Bi-lev­el Pos­i­tive Air­way Pres­sure (BPAP). Nurs­es ex­pect­ed him to re­cov­er from the COVID-19 dis­ease, which claimed over 1600 lives.

His ICU nurse, Josette Bethel-Smith, re­spond­ed to him:

“Sure you can. How else would they see you? It is the on­ly form of com­mu­ni­ca­tion you all have right now.”

Shar­ing her sto­ry at the Min­istry of Health's COVID-19 up­date, Bethel-Smith said she ex­pect­ed him to re­unite with his fam­i­ly. But his health wors­ened, re­sult­ing in him un­der­go­ing oral in­tu­ba­tion and be­ing hooked up to me­chan­i­cal ven­ti­la­tion. He died a few days lat­er.

“I felt that be­cause I told him to talk to them all you want be­cause not many peo­ple get to do that,” she re­vealed.

Bethel-Smith al­ways loved be­ing a nurse, but the last cou­ple of months made her ques­tion her ca­reer choice. With so many deaths, es­pe­cial­ly among the un­vac­ci­nat­ed, she said this trau­ma­tis­es nurs­es, who al­ready are emo­tion­al­ly and phys­i­cal­ly drained.

Oc­to­ber record­ed more COVID-19 in­fec­tions than the pre­vi­ous three months, as schools and more busi­ness­es re­opened. Some peo­ple con­tin­ue to take COVID-19 light­ly or crit­i­cise the care pa­tients re­ceive. How­ev­er, Bethel-Smith said peo­ple would nev­er un­der­stand what goes on in an ICU un­less they are there. A day in the ICU is ex­haust­ing for nurs­es, who are some­times un­able to eat, drink or use the bath­room when need­ed. They can spend six to 12 hours wear­ing Per­son­al Pro­tec­tive Equip­ment to en­sure they can re­spond prompt­ly to pa­tients’ needs. Bethel-Smith said they al­so make sure pa­tients video call their rel­a­tives, as some­times, it is their last con­ver­sa­tion with those they love.

She said nurs­es bare­ly get time to rest and see their fam­i­lies. To help ease their work­load, she plead­ed with the un­vac­ci­nat­ed to get vac­ci­nat­ed and for every­one to fol­low the pub­lic health mea­sures.

"We can on­ly do so much. A pa­tient’s sta­tus can change with­out warn­ing. And some­times, rel­a­tives are asked to make what could be life-chang­ing de­ci­sions on be­half of their loved ones. And as nurs­es, it is hard be­cause we are the ones tasked with en­sur­ing we do what is re­quired to keep their rel­a­tive alive,” Bethel-Smith said.

The ICU housed 22 pa­tients but re­cent­ly in­creased its ca­pac­i­ty for an ad­di­tion­al 19. ICU pa­tients vary in ages, from chil­dren to the el­der­ly who are crit­i­cal­ly ill and re­quire high amounts of oxy­gen through face masks or me­chan­i­cal ven­ti­la­tion, con­stant mon­i­tor­ing and a cock­tail of med­ica­tion.

She al­so warned that peo­ple who smoke have a more dif­fi­cult time with COVID-19 be­cause it is a res­pi­ra­to­ry dis­ease.