Doctor suicide a reminder of virus's toll on health care
Health workers need more than platitudes to combat the immense strain they're under
The death of a 35-year-old doctor from Roxton Pond may not figure into the official COVID-19 casualty count.
But Dr. Karine Dion's suicide in early January is just as much a result of the pandemic as if she'd succumbed to the lethal virus.
Toiling on the front lines since the spring, she was on her second mental health leave from the Granby hospital where she worked in the emergency room when she died. Exhausted and despondent, yet guilt-ridden over her absence from the job of saving lives, she took her own, leaving behind a young son and a husband to grieve a heartbreaking and senseless loss.
But amid their anguish, Dion's family and friends have spoken out to share their tragedy. For she is not alone in buckling under the extraordinary pressure placed on health-care workers during this emergency. Her suicide is a wake-up call about the outsized toll the pandemic is taking on the mental health and well-being of the medical community.
After months of relentless effort, they are worn out by all they have done, seen, witnessed and experienced. But even with the arrival of a vaccine, the end of the pandemic is a long way off. In fact, the most difficult challenges likely lie ahead, as case counts continue to soar, hospitalizations rise and the ranks of those left to care for a deluge of critically ill patients rapidly dwindles.
More will be asked of already exhausted doctors, nurses, orderlies, and laboratory technicians in the coming weeks. But how much do they have left to give?
Individuals and union representatives have been warning for months of silent suffering among health workers who cry in their cars after interminable shifts or try to keep dark thoughts at bay after traumatizing ordeals.
Since the beginning of the crisis, they have lived in constant dread. They were and are scared of contracting the virus or bringing it home to family members. At first they had to worry about whether there was enough personal protective equipment to keep them safe. Now it's the bitter pill of forced overtime and cancelled vacations, increasing the risks of weary foot soldiers making mistakes.
Before the holidays, Premier François Legault noted that nearly 7,500 health workers were missing in action for various reasons, from those on leaves of absence to those having to quarantine due to exposure. A report obtained by Le Journal de Montréal in December put the total number of medical staff who have been infected since last March at 30,000. It's no wonder many are simply leaving the profession for good.
It's not only fear and fatigue, though. Frustration is also leaving many bereft.
At the same time we are placing such a heavy load on the shoulders of doctors and nurses, some people have stopped heeding public health directives.
The Quebec government has estimated up to 30 per cent of the population is flouting its rules. A recent poll by Léger for the Association for Canadian Studies found nearly half of Canadians visited family over the holidays, in defiance of restrictions on gatherings.
Meanwhile, many feel betrayed by reports of travellers cavorting on tropical beaches and politicians, hospital CEOS and other highly placed officials jetting off on foreign getaways. It's like kicking them while they're down.
But perhaps the most difficult thing to bear is that, time and again, authorities fail to heed their pleas for more robust actions to curtail the spread of COVID-19, to save lives and to spare the ailing health system.
Instead we get half measures that make their jobs more difficult.
The situation in Quebec ICUS is critical beyond anything we saw during the first wave last spring. Meanwhile, hospitalizations have doubled in Montreal since mid-december, leading to the postponement of 140,000 procedures across Quebec.
For healers and caregivers, the scars of the pandemic will endure long after COVID-19 is brought under control. The sickness and death will continue. They will be haunted by patients they couldn't save from more common ailments left untreated.
Health-care workers like Dr. Dion may be in our thoughts and prayers. They may be heralded as guardian angels and offered gratitude laced with platitudes. But what they really want is to be respected as scientists and have their expert advice followed.
If the pandemic has exposed all the cracks in the health system, the sustained struggle against the virus has put an incalculable strain on those who work in it.
No matter how professional, compassionate and resilient they are, we must not forget, they are only human.