HEART BREAKING
Nurse may have to move out of home to help save lives & protect her children
A NURSE fighting coronavirus on the front line has revealed how she may have to temporarily leave her three young children in order to help save lives.
Young mum Emma Murphy, who works in the Emergency Department of Mercy University Hospital in Cork as a clinical nurse manager, said it’s the calm before the storm and she fears the worst is yet to come.
Speaking to the Irish Sunday Mirror, the 35-year-old added she and her husband Joe, who is a social care worker, will have to decide in the coming days who is going to move out of the family home.
She admitted they fear passing Covid-19 on to their children, Molly, 7, Jack, 5, and Lucy who turns three today.
She said: “While it has been quiet enough, we have been doing loads of preparation, loads of simulations and organising the department with walls and partitions around every cubicle.
“There’s a high level of anticipation because we have been warned and are worried about what’s going to come.
“In my experience my last three shifts have been a lot busier. We’re getting more patients in with underlying health conditions who have been very unwell.
“There’s a huge level of anticipation and stress. Myself and my husband work on the front line, he’s a social care worker with the HSE and I’m in A&E and we have three small kids.
“So we’re having an ongoing discussion as to which one of us is going to leave the home.
ORDEAL
“There’s a high chance it will be me who has to leave the house. The prospect of missing my little girl’s birthday on Sunday when she turns three is heartbreaking.
“But at the end of the day if we gave the virus to one of our kids we would never forgive ourselves.”
And Emma revealed she has been left with physical marks from PPE gear she has to wear during her shifts.
She explained: “I had a recess case for two hours and when I took the goggles off my face was very sore and marked. One of my colleagues had marks on her face for hours after.”
Meanwhile, a doctor treating patients with coronavirus said it’s hard not to get emotionally tied up in the situation and admitted she has cried following the deaths of people from the disease.
Dr Cliona Ni Cheallaigh, who is a consultant in general medicine and infectious diseases at St James’s Hospital in Dublin, revealed: “It’s hard to lose a loved one at the best of times and then families can’t spend as much time as they want in the hospital with them.
“We have all cried. I mean you are human. The doctors, nurses, porters, and catering staff care for the people that we look after and, like them, that’s why we do what we do.
“But I think the good thing in all this is how nice people are being to one another. It’s what’s keeping us together – that we’re all in this together.
She added: “I think the only thing that will really make a huge difference is a vaccine which we are working on very hard and it will come and is coming as quickly as it can.
“But until that happens it’s going to be very hard for life to go back to normal because it’s so infectious when people have it. I think we all believe we’ll just wake up and it will have been a dream. Still on some levels it just doesn’t feel real.” The mother of two boys said the only weapon we have is staying apart and washing our hands. She added: “Stay isolated, don’t mix with other people. It means we don’t get overwhelmed, it means we have enough ventilators, we have enough beds, we have enough nurses to look after people in the way that we know how to.”
Also on the front line, paramedic and firefighter with Dublin Fire Brigade, Nigel Crowley, 45, revealed he is on call 24/7 and also fears bringing coronavirus home to his young family.
He said: “I’ve been a paramedic with the DFB for 18 years and I have to say this is a very difficult time for us all.
“I would say the majority of calls these days are listed as potential Covid-19 cases as each patient may display some or all of the signs and symptoms of the disease and therefore have to be treated as potential cases.
“But while the majority of cases are treated as coronavirus only a small percentage I have taken to hospital have turned out to be positive.
“Every day I go to work I worry about my exposure to Covid-19 and the
Stay isolated. It means we have enough ventilators, beds & nurses to look after people
DR CLIONA NI CHEALLAIGH ST JAMES’S HOSPITAL MEDIC
possibility that I may be infected due to the high-risk nature of the job.
Nigel added: “At the end of every shift I make sure to decontaminate my uniform and myself before I travel back to my family who are isolated at home away from any potential risk.
“It’s always a massive worry to me that I may carry the infection home with me and put my own family at risk.
“This is a situation which is difficult to understand at times.
“However, I understand the risk associated with my job as a firefighter and paramedic and I make sure to take all precautions necessary to ensure the safety of my family.” Nigel, based at
Blanchardstown fire station, explained what procedures he follows when called out to a potential coronavirus case. He said: “On arrival at the premises one crew member will put on the full PPE which consists of a plastic apron, gloves and goggles for eye protection. The driver of the ambulance will also put on their PPE.
“The driver will then call to the door – keeping a safe distance away – and will leave a face mask to whoever meets them and instructs them to place it on the patient before the other paramedic enters the property to examine them. Only one paramedic will enter the property in order to reduce the risk to both paramedics from being in the contamination zone.
“Once we agree the patient needs to be transported to hospital, we will notify the hospital of our arrival with full patient vitals given.
“On arrival the patient will be delivered directly to an area of the hospital which has been designated for Covid-19 cases.
“After handing over the patient, the crew and ambulance has to be fully decontaminated so there is no further risk of infection.”
At the end of every shift I decontaminate my uniform and myself before I go home
NIGEL CROWLEY PARAMEDIC AND FIREFIGHTER