For hospital workers, a fourth wave of COVID-19 means the fourth time they'll be dealing with not just a surge in cases, but also heartbroken families, the death of their patients and the resulting mental health struggles.
Houston Public Media spoke with Avery Taylor, the managing nurse at Houston Methodist's highly infectious disease unit, about whether the current surge of infections feels different from previous ones.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What Is It Like In The Hospital Now?
You know, the first couple rounds, it was chaotic and frantic, but there was a lot of energy from health care providers. We felt like this was really meaningful work that we were doing. These people needed our help. That鈥檚 not the feeling this time around. This time around feels like we鈥檙e walking into a cave of needless suffering. These patients don鈥檛 need to be in hospital beds. We have a magic bullet and we鈥檙e not taking it.
Are You Saying That Because The Majority Of People Ending Up In The Hospital Now For COVID Are Unvaccinated?
Yeah, so that鈥檚 the really hard part about this. As health care providers, we鈥檝e recommended everybody in our life get vaccinated. The statistics don鈥檛 lie 鈥� 98% of patients in Methodist hospitals right now are not vaccinated.
With You And Your Team Of Nurses, What Is The General Attitude In Your Unit Now?
So general attitude is of frustration. You know, obviously we got into health care to take care of people, we want to help people, but we鈥檙e having to do some mental gymnastics to really dig down and find our compassion right now.
I feel very committed that any patient that ends up in our beds, we are going to take care of and take care of well. But I spent Sunday at church just crying through the service because I鈥檓 so sad, and I鈥檓 so frustrated, that there are going to be people who suffer and die when they don鈥檛 have to. And I don鈥檛 know, at this point, what else to say or how to appeal to people鈥檚 emotions or their logical brains to change their minds and to get vaccinated.
I honestly was in denial. Like all of last week, even as I鈥檝e been hiring nurses and opening the second unit, I was thinking, 鈥淥h, it鈥檚 just a spike from Fourth of July. Surely this is not what we鈥檙e doing again.鈥� And each day the numbers went up and went up. I guess denial is a great coping mechanism because I finally realized, 鈥渙h gosh, like we鈥檙e really doing this again.鈥�
What Are You Doing To Take Care Of Yourself? What Are People In Your Unit Doing To Take Care Of Each Other?
This week鈥檚 been pretty busy. I can鈥檛 say that I鈥檝e done a very good job taking care of myself. But overall, a lot of my staff has started going to therapy, including me. It is not unusual for my staff to say something like, 鈥渨ell, my therapist says,鈥� which I think is great. We鈥檙e also reading books together. We have a book 鈥� the title is 鈥淏efore Agreement.鈥� Reading together has calmed a lot of anxiety, it鈥檚 brought us a lot of peace, like it鈥檚 helped us communicate with each other better, so that鈥檚 been nice.
Even With All These Efforts To Normalize Taking Care Of Your Mental Health And Talk About It, Do You Feel Like It鈥檚 Made A Measurable Change? Or Do You Feel Like Even That鈥檚 Not Enough?
It鈥檚 only enough if you use it. But I know my nurses are hurting. I know that I鈥檓 hurting. We don鈥檛 want to do this again. But I think my biggest concern is like, at what cost? And I don鈥檛 think anybody has answers for that yet. I think only time is going to tell us how many nurses end up leaving the profession. I want to think that it鈥檚 not going to be anybody, but I鈥檓 sure that that will end up happening.
