COVID-19 spreading like ‘fire’ at geriatric hospital, doctor says
‘Right now, I have to assume that everyone I work with has coronavirus’
“It feels like the building is on fire.”
This is how Dr. David Lussier describes the situation inside Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal (IUGM), a geriatric centre where dozens of new COVID-19 cases have emerged in the past two weeks. The outbreak has spread to the point where no new patients are being admitted to the IUGM.
Lussier works in the last pavilion without any confirmed cases of coronavirus, but that will probably change in the coming days.
More and more of the patients he helps recover from hip or joint injuries are displaying symptoms of the virus: high fever, coughing and shortness of breath. Adding to that stress, some of them share rooms with patients who have COVID -19.
“Everyone is doing their best, to offer palliative care, to ease their suffering, but the ones who do die will die of suffocation,” Lussier said. “There’s no way around it. It’s not a nice thing to witness. Doctors and nurses (in long-term care centres) are watching patients — people they’ve known for years — die one after the other.
“And because of how contagious the virus is, they’re dying alone, without their family in the room. It’s incredibly sad.”
The centre has been divided into “cold zones” where patients don’t have the virus and “hot zones” where they’re infected, but those lines are starting to blur. About a dozen of Lussier’s cold zone patients are awaiting results for their COVID-19 tests and he has been working with them for weeks.
“Right now, I have to assume that everyone I work with has coronavirus,” said Lussier, who added that government-run geriatric centres have been the “blind spot” of Quebec’s response to COVID-19.
Lussier only started wearing a mask last week and now he’s in a situation where he’s regularly sporting a face shield, gown and gloves while treating patients.
“There’s confusion about whether the lunch trays are contaminated and have to be thrown out. The lines between people’s jobs are disappearing,” Lussier said. “You’ll have physiotherapists helping the elderly to the bathroom. I drove to pick up a new admission the other day. Everyone — from orderlies to handymen — is working as hard as they can to contain this.”
One woman whose mother is a patient at the IUGM said she was told there are at least 34 confirmed cases just on her mother’s ward. She added that the infected share rooms with those awaiting test results, a detail Lussier confirmed.
The doctor yawned several times during his interview with the Montreal Gazette and says he’s starting to lose track of time as the days bleed into weeks. People like Lussier and the staff are working flat out every day.
Now that he may have been exposed to the virus, Lussier says he has had to have a difficult conversation with his wife — who is also a doctor.
“I live in a house with my wife and four children. If it came down to it, I might have to isolate myself from them completely,” said Lussier, whose kids range in age from 7 to 14. “Unless I sleep in the garage, I pretty much have to live in a separate home than my family. It’s all or nothing.”
Family time has been a saving grace since the beginning of the outbreak. Lussier, his wife and the kids watch District 31 on TV every night and things unfold with a comfortable familiarity: the seven-year-old twins fall asleep and everyone huddles together in the living room as the virus continues to devastate the world outside.
The couple is doing everything they can to let go of that chaos once they walk into their home: most of their work gear stays in the garage, they immediately wash their scrubs and take a shower once they get in. There are days where the children struggle with confinement, but Lussier says he’s impressed at how resilient they are.
“The 14-year-old can basically run the household when we’re not around,” Lussier said. “But we want to be there for them. I see a lot of people post things about how, during the pandemic, they’ve gotten to know their kids better. We haven’t had time for that, unfortunately, but we’re lucky to still have our jobs.
“This reminds me a bit of Sept. 11, 2001. I was in New York when the towers fell and I think we knew right away the world would never be the same. I don’t know if things will ever be as they were before the virus.
“Will we rediscover life as it once was? I don’t know. And that’s scary.”