I write in solidarity with health care workers caring for COVID patients. Expressing gratitude and christening them as heroes have been generous ways to honor them. But I wish that our communities could do more to emulate their examples of compassion, conscientiousness and altruism.
As a retired critical care physician, I have been fortunate that my colleagues at Rochester General Hospital have not needed my help yet. I do appreciate though the ordeals that my colleagues face. “Ordinary life” is sequestered from experiences of illness and death; hospitals concentrate them, and hospital personnel continually face them. They approach the technical work professionally, but their work (unlike most other work) exists always in the presence of illness, dying or death – they always have to confront their own and others’ suffering, losses and grief. A grueling paradox is that there is an impulse to maintain excellence and compassion in one’s work, but a struggle to do so without being overwhelmed by emotion and exhaustion – especially in this time of pandemic.
The funnel that feeds the flood of COVID patients is large and expanding, and the container that accepts them is close to full. Hundreds of patients today need treatment in area hospitals, because there have been thousands of cases in the community. With hospital and intensive care units overflowing, staffs have taken on unaccustomed functions and responsibilities. They have gone many extra miles in support of their patients and one another. Many have had to work overtime, while being stretched also to maintain their roles outside the hospital. Their suffering differs from that of patients and families, but if they have not become calloused to suffering, they too suffer. There is one positive note: despite virus everywhere in the hospital, it is possible to avoid contracting COVID there – social distancing with meticulous handwashing and PPE use prevents the spread of coronavirus.
Health care workers try to alleviate others’ suffering (compassion); we can try to help to reduce their difficulties. They do their best because they are needed (conscientiousness); everyone can commit to efforts that slow the spread of virus. They and their colleagues show up regardless of personal difficulties (altruism); we can also tolerate inconveniences for the benefit of others. Compassion, conscientiousness and altruism are potentials within all of us.
“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.” – John F. Kennedy
[This essay was submitted to our local paper, but not accepted for publication. – DL]