by Tracey Bowers-Lee and Melanie Lennon
Patty Tamlin has been an intensive care nurse at Scarborough Health Network’s Birchmount site in Ontario for almost thirty-five years.
She worked the frontlines during the SARS outbreak in 2003 and later contracted the virus.
Once again, she finds herself on the battleground, this time-fighting COVID-19.
Can you tell me a little bit about your experience with SARS?
Well, SARS was obviously in 2003. So, during that time, I was working in critical care and we heard about this virus coming out of that area. And our manager at the time happened to be of Chinese descent as well and could understand it and was reading the papers and was hearing about this.
So, we were kind of having a bit of an advantage at that time, knowing that she knew about it. We had, in our organization, the first index patient, as they say, who was a young man who came in and his mom had come back from China, and had died actually at home…
The physician thought it was TB (tuberculosis), but he knew to isolate this patient. And after that, of course, we then realized that it was SARS, this thing that was coming from China.
Are the COVID-19 symptoms similar to SARS symptoms?
Yes and no…There's different levels of SARS like there is with coronavirus. Now with COVID-19, people end up having different systems and different seriousness. So, for example, with SARS, I ended up being told to go to West Park (Healthcare Centre in Toronto), which they opened up a floor for a number of us and where we had to go and be isolated.
And when I first entered, I really wasn't feeling that bad other than the continued fever, until I did feel bad and had the pneumonia and had you know, a slower heart rate and had no energy and all that sort of stuff. So, I did get a lot sicker.
My daughter also had a mild case of SARS and she was 14 at the time and so her situation wasn't as severe. So, it's not unlike the coronavirus. You hear these massive numbers of the millions around the world who have had coronavirus.
But that does not mean they're all in hospital and it does not mean they're all in intensive care. Those numbers are huge, but many of them may feel unusual. Sometimes unusual symptoms and some have truly the respiratory symptoms, as well.
You nurses that had been through SARS, how are you handling yet another pandemic?
I think one thing that's greatly different with this one compared to the last one is the volume of people that are affected. So clearly, the spread of this one seems to be much, much easier, it's so much easier spread…And you have various levels of how people feel and I've spoken to a number of peers and co-workers and people on the outside of healthcare. And you're looking at various levels of staff who have PTSD…even from people who did not have SARS.
I did and yet I do continue to go to work with COVID. There are people who didn't have SARS, and are so panicked by it that they can't work. Or they have quit their jobs because they're that terrified or people who have to work from home because they need to and that's it.
People experience things differently and how I might experience it based on my health, my life, whatever it is, we handle things differently and that encompasses us as different people. So, you're seeing a various level but bottom line, everybody is really terribly concerned and worried.
How is the PPE (personal protective equipment) supply at your hospital?
Well, one of the things that a number of organizations are doing because they are concerned about supplies – we are, you know, sort of allotted to masks per day at the moment…
Even though I'm not with a COVID patient, I'm wearing a mask. And the purpose of that is such that if I'm asymptomatic, and I'm at work, and I wear a mask, I won't have the droplets to spread to somebody else. And then they too, are wearing a mask to not spread it to somebody else and somewhat protect ourselves…
We also wear our caps and we also wear gowns, and we also wear gloves, which doesn't preclude the necessity to wash your hands as well. But it is more difficult to work in that environment…
So currently we have at the moment enough [masks] where we're kind of rationing and we may end up actually, we save them in boxes to potentially, it's not there yet, but potentially sterilize them for reuse.
The masks may be reused?
As long as they're not torn apart or really particularly dirty because there is a concern about, will we have enough masks for ourselves to protect ourselves in the future. We are actually reusing N95 [masks]. We’ll currently take them per day and put them into paper bags and reuse them each time we go into see a patient. That is not normal practice in normal life pre-COVID.
What we do is, each time we go into a room, even if it's the same patient, we would get rid of that mask every time for every intervention. But because of the concern of the supplies of these masks to make sure they're available, we will actually reuse it for the shifts that we’re there.
So that means, you know, we have a process called doffing to make sure that we take the mask off in a particular way. And again, we always have to wash our hands.
How long do you think the pandemic will last?
I do predict that it will be a while and I do believe and support the very careful and graduated opening of businesses and people going in public. The key thing with that is we were lucky not to be overwhelmed for the most part in the healthcare system. The long-term healthcare places are suffering right at this moment in time. But the idea is, you know, we don't want this to continue for 12 months.
And if it is done well, and in a graduated process, if there are little spikes, which I think there could possibly be, they would be smaller, maintained and tracked much more quickly and easily. And we wouldn't have a huge wave where we are all in the same place, again, four months down the road.
When we come out of it, as frustrating as it may be, as difficult and financially difficult on many levels for many people, it needs to be done right. Because then you're not doing it again and to have to have to suffer through this process again.
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