“The day that we had our first COVID deaths at our Hospital. That was a challenging day.”

The day that we had our first COVID deaths at our hospital. That was a challenging day. I came in,I must have been working second shift that day. Because I came in and the nurse that I was working with had lost that first patient shortly, before I came came in. And then, during the evening, we had somebody who transferred in from one of the, the nursing homes. And was basically just there for palliative care. We knew that the nurses knew that was not somebody who was going to make it. So with the ICU rooms, we can watch the the patients stats, you know, their oxygen levels, their heart rate, blood pressure, all that kind of stuff from out in the hall at the nurses station. And I remember standing around with the nurses watching, ‘cuz we knew imminently we were going to have to go in that they could see stats, steadily declining. They had paged for the doctor to come, but it was becoming clear doctor wasn’t going to to make it probably in time. And I don’t know the exact rules, but there was rule something along the lines that either, you know, you would have a doctor there to, to pronounce time of death or two nurses could do it, or, like the nurse supervisor with another nurse, something like that. So, we were watching the stats declining and  it was clear that doctor wasn’t going to get there and the nurse that had already lost one patient earlier in the day just, was – she  we rushed to get into the room because she she didn’t want the patient to to die alone. So I remember rushing to, to get her, you know, get her gowned up. Fumbling with the the gown strings because we could see the numbers going down down, getting her connected with the paper, and with her her kindness, and her compassion as she went in and sat at the patient’s bedside, those last moments. So, that was not, not something I ever planned to, to be witnessing.