On the frontline: ‘It’s heartbreaking. It will never leave you’
Healthcare workers tell Amy Molloy about the relentless Covid workload which is taking a toll on their lives
Frontline workers have spoken out about the impact of the pandemic on their health and personal relationships after the Oireachtas Health Committee heard how staff are suffering from ‘burnout’. Michelle Kingston, who works at Cork University Hospital and has been working as a nurse for 30 years, says the tiredness she is feeling is like nothing she has ever experienced before. “It’s a lot more psychological. When you have a patient who is dying and only one family member can come in, it is heartbreaking and it’s something that will never leave you.”
MICHELLE KINGSTON has been working as a nurse in an emergency department for 30 years, but the tiredness she feels at the end of a shift nowadays is like nothing she experienced before.
“It’s a different kind of tired as it’s a lot more psychological. When you’re watching young, fit patients in their 40s trying to catch a breath, it’s hard to understand. When you have a patient who is dying and only one family member can come in, it is heartbreaking and it’s something that will never leave you.”
Frontline workers have spoken out about the impact of the pandemic on their health and personal relationships after the Oireachtas Health Committee heard how staff are suffering from “burnout”.
Ms Kingston (50) works at Cork University Hospital (CUH), one of the hospitals which has been worst hit during the third coronavirus wave.
Long hours are something she is accustomed to, but what’s draining about the pandemic is how she feels “absolutely helpless”.
“Before, we had a family room and you could lay out the body and the family could grieve for a while – but that’s gone now,” she told the Irish Independent.
“That is one of the hardest things – no, actually it is the hardest. You feel you’re to blame, you feel it’s your fault that you can’t let people in to be with loved ones and you do take it home with you.
“How I take things home with me is that I stay quiet, and the knock-on effect is that my husband and son know to stay away from me. I would come home at night time, get a shower, come downstairs and fall asleep on the couch and be no good to anybody.”
She praised management at the hospital for their handling of a difficult situation. At one point, 135 patients were being treated at CUH for Covid. Dozens of staff also contracted the virus.
“We kept going with overtime. We would do extra shifts to help out but I never worked more than two days in a row. We have had a good few nurses in our department who contracted it. We have nurses who were out as they were in contact and that’s where the absenteeism would come in, as one person could have been in contact with 10 others. We’re lucky in that we have a department of young, very skilled nurses, but it does take its toll.
“The thing with lockdown is there’s nothing else to do. When you come home, you can’t visit friends and it’s as if you’re living separately from your family. I haven’t seen my father-in-law in nearly a year.”
Widespread vacancies, excessive workloads and a high Covid-19 infection rate among healthcare staff have also been flagged by unions.
There’s a pause on the end of the phone as Dr Mick Molloy tries to recall when he last had substantial time off from work. “I can’t actually remember, to be honest with you.”
The consultant in emergency medicine at Wexford General Hospital works between 80 and 100 hours a week. He doesn’t complain or seek sympathy, but like most healthcare workers he is exhausted.
“People are tired in their jobs at the moment and they can’t take leave as hospitals are under pressure. The number of vacancies among consultants are increasing, junior doctors are being recruited from overseas as our own graduates are leaving the country and some staff are wanting to move to areas where they don’t have the same risk of catching Covid,” Dr Molloy said.
Working such long hours means there’s very little time for anything else.
“I know personally I haven’t been doing as much exercise as the workload has increased so dramatically. I need to do more than just walking and now that gyms are closed, it’s hard.” Wexford’s emergency department has always been busy, treating up to 40,000 patients each year, according to Dr Molloy.
He’s used to a heavy workload but the pandemic, particularly the third wave, has been on another level.
“It’s difficult working at the moment as we’re seeing a lot of patients present to the emergency department with post-Covid issues such as cardiac and respiratory problems. Every day we have people coming who were Covid positive two, three or four weeks ago and they are having ongoing chest pains. While the health system as a whole had a lot of people on waiting lists, we now have a whole new group of people for a new waiting list for complications from a disease we’re still trying to figure out.”
The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) told the committee that there is a “severe shortage” of public hospital consultants which “has resulted in excessive workloads being carried by understaffed medical and surgical teams to the detriment of patients”.
Dr Imran Sulaiman, a respiratory consultant at Beaumont Hospital in Dublin, returned to Ireland last March after four years in New York.
He previously worked on a Covid ward at NYU Langone Health in the US before responding to the Government call-out for healthcare workers to come home.
“I’ve been exhausted since I moved back, even before. We were working seven days a week at NYU, crazy hours. On top of that, the isolation from
‘Before, the family could grieve for a while – but that’s gone now’
the lockdown doesn’t allow you to do anything outside of work, so it has been extremely exhausting.
“It’s been a difficult year. My wife and I were apart while I was living in America, then I came back and I’ve been in work most of the time.”
Dr Sulaiman contracted Covid-19 last April, shortly after starting work at Beaumont.
“I was fortunate that I wasn’t admitted to hospital. My main symptoms were extreme lethargy, difficulty concentrating, sleeping quite a lot for those two weeks. It took the full two weeks out of me. I thought after a week I would be seeing an improvement, but for a full two weeks I was symptomatic.
“There is an issue with exhaustion and mental health now. We brought in some psychology services in the hospital to talk to our department about stress relief, different ways of relaxing, trying to find outlets for exhaustion. I cycle in and out to work every day to try get some exercise, started a book club with friends and try spend as much time with my wife as I can.”
‘I cycle in and outto work every day to try get some exercise’