It’s hard to keep your cool even with safety protocols
Kelly Phillips, 28
• Critical-care registered nurse • In job 5 years • Engaged to Dr. Evan Janzen
Kelly Phillips’ voice cracks with emotion as she talks about being at the bedside of a frightened young adult with COVID-19.
“Young healthy people, they’re really scared,” says the critical-care nurse. “Being able to be there to comfort them and get them through this illness has been a total privilege.”
“They have kids and they have a lot to lose, and so being with them and holding their hand while, you know, wearing all your personal protective equipment, is a pretty cool moment.”
Like her colleagues, Phillips struggles with the need to get to patients quickly, while putting on and taking off personal protective equipment in the right order to prevent contagion.
Because each ICU nurse is typically assigned one patient, she says, “we are very protective of our patient.”
“If alarms are going off, we are very quick to respond, and having that delay is emotionally taxing sometimes because you just want to get in there,” Phillips says. “There are many times you want to put yourself aside and you just want to go in that room and calm your patient and reassure them and stop that beep or change that bag or whatever you need to do, but you have to keep that in the back of your mind that you have to be safe.
“Our unit has adopted an attitude of ‘let’s slow things down, let’s not panic, we’re going to be safe, we’re going to be honest and we’re going to be very attentive to each other.’ ” It’s not easy. Even with all the safety protocols, unintentional exposure can happen.
Phillips cites a personal example: While she was moving a patient, a ventilator detached, causing “a massive amount of exposure.”
In those times, care providers become hyper-aware of their contacts and the incubation period for the virus — an infected person will typically develop symptoms within five days to 11 days, but it can be as long as 14 days before someone knows they are sick.
“It’s very stressful and you can feel responsible for everyone around you, as well as your own well-being,” she says.
Phillips considers herself lucky that her fiancé, Dr. Evan Janzen, works in the same ICU and understands “the emotional roller-coaster” of working in a pandemic.
“We’ve both been in very close contact with multiple COVID patients, so we’re coming home together with the same amount of exposure.”
For now, they are isolating, and can’t visit Janzen’s sick father.
The couple’s summer wedding has also been postponed because of the pandemic.
“We joke about getting married in the ICU together,” Phillips says.