Working in an NYC Hospital During the COVID-19 Pandemic

53 Comments

Most of us haven’t been inside a COVID-19 ward, and it’s hard to fathom what frontline medical workers are experiencing every day.

That’s why I want to share this video with Danielle Ofri, MD, PhD with you.

Danielle is an attending physician at Bellevue Hospital in New York, and she’s worked with COVID-19 patients at the epicenter of the crisis in the US.

We asked her what mental health professionals need to understand about what medical workers are going through right now. I’ll let you hear the answer from her.

Click here for full transcript

In thinking about the mental health needs of health care workers in the setting of this pandemic, there’s a couple of different phases. One was the run-up phase where everyone was just sort of plunging in the sprint, and I would say no one really thought about mental health then. Everyone was so driven then. There was the middle phase which you could either call the plateau or the abyss, depending on on which way you look at it because it really was both, and that was a very sort of long slog and I think that’s when many of the issues began to come up for people but there wasn’t really time to think about them or process them. The issues that came up during the most intense part was the the shock of how sick patients were and how quickly many patients died and how fast things were happening. There really wasn’t much precedent for that, I mean those of us who trained during the time of the HIV epidemic had familiarity with that sort of intense death and destruction feel. I look at our trainees now and this was completely new for them, so it was a very different sense of those who’ve never been at that before to see your patients really mowed down at rates that were staggering and in manners that were staggering. Even for those of us who experienced HIV, the pace was much more intense. I think of it as the HIV epidemic crossed with hurricane sandy and that sort of intense time pressure all together. That’s the thing that I think we need to recognize that many people in healthcare of the sort of younger generation haven’t seen this at all and so many people have seen a few patients die in their career, or over time, but not tens and dozens. That’s really quite existential, I think, for people, nurses, doctors, healthcare aides who really haven’t faced that and really thought about what death means. The first thing is just to approach the sense of what it means when you see a patient die if you haven’t been in a war before, and I think military doctors may be more prepared for this but civilian doctors really aren’t. In terms of how mental health care practitioners can assist with that, part of it is just bringing up the conversation because during the whole time, and honestly even now, there isn’t a lot of space to talk about it. People are talking in little bits and corners and hallways and offline, but there hasn’t been sort of an honest reckoning of what it is meant to be in in this sort of sea of what feels like death and destruction, particularly because the death and destruction feels divorced from what the rest of society is seeing. Everyone else may tune into their governor’s briefings and they see the charts and they see the numbers, but they haven’t really seen those patients and it’s quite a different feeling. I think a lot about the people who are protesting the lockdowns now, and I have sympathy for them, obviously being cooped up is really hard, but if you have never stepped inside the ward or the emergency room, there’s no connection to what’s there. It’s just this number or this order you can’t move out and and so the disconnect of the experience of the healthcare workers having compared with what their friends and family might be experiencing, what the general public has experienced, is quite vast. I think a starting point is to recognize that in many ways, healthcare workers feel a little bit isolated from the rest of society, that we’re seeing this but no one else is. It’s very hard to kind of jive those two experiences together, one unique part of the COVID crisis was the rapidity with which patients declined and the absence of family members to help those patients. Normally when patients are sick and ill and dying, patients have their family, they have other people at the bedside, and so the sense of loneliness was very powerful and healthcare workers were pulled into this role where they normally don’t, I mean nurses and doctors are empathetic and they step in and help, but usually they’re also assisting family members and social workers. Healthcare workers ended up being much more closer to the emotional bone, whether it was by using their phone to facetime with family members, or being the only one there. I’ll share with you during mid April when it was really the depths or the the height of it, I was helping out in the emergency room. We had one half of the ER, another ICU, so I was working there and the patients were just sort of lined up, everyone on a ventilator. Part of it was just the chaos of that we had tons of nurses and doctors from different services, different hospitals, we had ventilators donated from everywhere, so there’s a bit of a chaos feeling. There was one patient whose temperature kept rising like I’ve never seen it, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 108.8, which I didn’t even know was compatible with life but it was. We were racing around to get ice packs and we had to put in an arterial line in her wrist, but her wrist was really swollen, she had all these little braided bracelets on and we had to cut them off. I cut them off with suture scissors and I put them in a specimen bag, and I thought what do I want to do with these, and so I stuffed them under the bed with her stuff. I hope her family gets them and part of me thought should I keep them just in case, but it was so chaotic would I lose track of this patient? I wasn’t really on her team, so I just left them under the stretcher. A couple days later she died, and I wondered if those bracelets ever got back to her family. I remember as we were cutting them off the resident and I was looking at them, and the resident said, “This is like the last bit of what’s really her. Everything else is gone. Her clothes are gone, her personality’s gone.” She’s at this point intubated and paralyzed and sedated and this is a set of about eight different bracelets, different colors, braided friendship bracelets and I regret that I didn’t keep them. I wasn’t supposed to do that, but I should have broken the rules, kept them, kept her name, and then I could have put them in an envelope and mailed them to her family. I think everyone has those sort of regrets of those little things you could have done, tiny things, but too much was happening and and I think those small things become places where we put all of our anxiety. Everything that I regret about what I could have done better, or more for my patients, or work longer hours, or whatever we could have done, come into that, I think everyone had a sense of we weren’t doing enough. It took many different roles to make this work, I mean lots of people had to stay home in their houses and call the thousands of patients who couldn’t come to keep them out of the hospital and keep them healthy, but those doctors and nurses felt really guilty they weren’t in the hospital helping the patients. Those in the hospital felt that they weren’t in the ICU and those in the ICU felt they weren’t working overnights and 24 hours a day, and so everyone had sort of sense of guilt they weren’t doing enough. Even when you were doing the most, but you got your day off you’re like I need to go in and I need to check the medical records from home and see what I can, and all of us felt sort of consecutive levels of guilt of not doing enough. I think we need people to speak openly from the top. I noticed a resident posted on twitter about the stress she was having, and then she said but I spoke with my psychiatrist and I’m feeling better now. I was so impressed that she came forward and said that, and that’s really destigmatizing. We need the chairs and the medical directors and the hospital talking about speaking with a therapist or a social worker or a psychologist or a psychiatrist, it’s really helpful. We’d be harming our patients if we didn’t care to this part of ourselves, just like we all get our flu shots and we get them because we don’t want to spread flu to our patients, and so tending to our emotional needs so that we can take better care of our patients. We don’t want to harm our patients by bringing in poorly adapted mechanisms from some other stressful period that we didn’t ever handle, so I think that walking the walk beyond just talking the talk from the top down would really help to destigmatize this. It’s hard to predict what the long-term mental health consequences will be. I remember after 9/11 we thought about how this would be really a permanent scarring on patients, on staff, on the community, and it seemed we would never heal from that. It was amazing to look back and see that people somehow managed to do that and I think they will again from this. The same with HIV, the thing with hurricane sandy, and all the various calamities and tragedies that we’ve faced. I think the recognition that it is a marathon and that COVID will certainly be there, even as we release from the lockdowns, and get past this peak it’s not going away, it’s not going to disappear, and so it’ll be there in the fall when people’s attention are on something else. I think maybe health care workers will start to feel a little bit ignored then, like oh everyone is on to something else, like we’re on to the elections, and but we’re still battling COVID here. Maybe setting systems in place to be there in the future, recognizing that there will be effects. What those effects are are hard to say but certainly many trainees and younger healthcare workers were very frightened by this and maybe don’t have a language to articulate that and how that might affect their choice of career, the choice of how they practice, what they ultimately choose to do. You may be influenced by this. We’ll need people there to just help guide that anxiety and distress that’s come from this. We may not yet know where it lands. The other thing I’ll put a plug for is the role of humanities and the arts in dealing with all of the emotions and in helping us smooth the edges of our practice. I’m slightly biased because I’m going to bring up the Bellevue Literary Review, this is our literary journal we publish from Bellevue and it’s fiction poetry and creative nonfiction about health and healing, open to the general public and we publish twice a year. We try to find things that people would find helpful to think about, things you might not have thought about, like the first patient who died on you, the first time you were afraid, and using creative ways. I think that music, arts, art literature really play a role, so much of medicine presented in the textbooks feels very straightforward, but the practice of medicine is filled with ambiguity in shades of gray and we have such discomfort and ambiguity in medicine. We want evidence-based medicine, but real people and real conditions are very ambiguous and so it’s profoundly unsettling and we don’t get much training in how to deal with ambiguity, but great works of art and literature and music specialize in ambiguity and shades of gray. That’s what makes them so fascinating, interesting in dissecting metaphors. Poetry is a way of looking at the complex things that don’t fit into easy boxes, so I would certainly encourage all of our mental health efforts, wellness efforts to incorporate the arts, music, literature, and the humanities because they treat a part of the issues we’re facing that don’t come in through the journals and textbooks.

In addition to her work as an internist, Danielle is also author of several books, including When We Do Harm: A Doctor Confronts Medical Error and What Doctors Feel: How Emotions Affect the Practice of Medicine. If you’d like to find out more, go to danielleofri.com.

Now we’d like to hear from you. Please tell us your biggest takeaways from the video below.

If you found this helpful, here are a few more resources you might be interested in:

When the COVID-19 Pandemic Leaves Us Feeling Helpless, with Bessel van der Kolk, MD

COVID-19 Frontliners and Moral Injury

What Can Help COVID-19 Frontliners Who Are Exhausted and Overwhelmed?

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53 Comments

Julie Forsyth, Physical Therapy, AU says

Please..You cannot really have sympathy with people who are protesting the inconvenience of lockdown.

However at age 21 and 22 worked in a paediatric hospital and various ICU with my colleague having to go on yes/no AZT the unknown drug with high risk arterial blood having gone into her eye so I do wholeheartedly agree and i have voiced this, the Covid 19 pandemic is so being like the HIV / AIDS Sydney frontline of the 1980s.

I am Australian and we morn for you knowing the current intense protests will hasten a huge surge in Covid 19 deaths and general reckless endangerment .

Do be informed as of yesterday we had 2 Covid 19 ventilated patients and 102 deaths. Our population is 25 million.

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Li Williams, Teacher, GB says

A very moving account from personal experience. Let us hope that the in the future we will be more prepared and more able to provide the necessary support for those medical staff who have had to fill the roles of family, priests, bereavement specialists alongside their own work. It has been tough initiation period for junior doctors and recently qualified nurses and medics. I hope this is acknowledged and that more training is provided for emotional resilience and support.

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joy ehrman, Marriage/Family Therapy, IL says

just excellent very powerful ans I am very happy to hear more from her
Thank you for bringing her to my attention~

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Debra Martinez, Psychotherapy, AR, USA says

Thank you for posting Dr. Ofri’s video. I’m thankful that she expressed her thoughts and feelings about the little girl and her bracelets. Our business if in medicine, social services or any other field we must remember is to honor one another’s humanity and this helps us to get better at practicing it.
Debra A. Martinez, LCSW, Psychotherapy and Behavioral Health Consultant in Little Rock, AR, USA.

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Sandra Cardão, Psychology, PT says

Brave Doctor! Congratulations on the book. I guess there is still a strong conviction, and prejudice, that everyone working with health is not affected emotionally, is not affected by stress, as if numb to human experience, or as if possessed by a God-complex! In fact, on the majority of the cases, it is precisely the opposite. Sel-care is so necessary to all health practitioners, and especially to whom is working on extreme and chaotic scenarios, or for too many hours, or on complex clinical cases. Yes, arts play an essential role on healing. Encouragement to start a new, creative look on the health chapter urges. Thank you for this essential and authentic share.

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Carla Kandel, Psychotherapy, USA says

Thank you for sharing Dr. Ofri’s video. The impact of this crisis on our health care providers is overlooked by the public and themselves in the understandable concern and priority for care for the patients. She brings forth very clearly the experience of what it is like for those on the front line. She encourages healthcare providers to engage in self-care whether it be reaching out to a therapist or through the arts. I found it very moving and informative.

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Elaine Cochrane, Clergy, CA says

I truly wanted to thank you for this video and this doctor who is so filled with compassion It is wonderful to hear her talk of a therapist without fear or shame. I am sure that so many of our front line workers will experience vicarious trauma and just being able to express how they feel hopefully will make a world of difference.
I am always truly blessed by your input. Thanks so much again

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claire ballantyne, Counseling, IT says

This talk affected me enormously. Now I understand better why so many health workers died themselves. I had imagined their experience in my own way, but this talk makes it so much clearer what exactly they’ve been going through and the effect this must have had on their own health. Very moving and informative.

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Ingrid Longo, Social Work, Newfane, VT, USA says

Thank you. Dr. Ofri’s exceptional warmth and accessibility make this a very informative presentation. The breadth of her approach to her material in straightforward language strengthens her availability which effectively connects us to her material. One of the best yet!

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Mary R says

Thank you so much to NICABM for doing this interview and posting it. What an education for all of us who imagine how this is for front line workers, but never actually witness it. It is essential information for mental health practitioners and indeed, for everyone.

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Dale Strihmaier, Another Field, CA says

Thank you there were so many issues raised with good n simple words

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Kathy McKenzie, Coach, AU says

Thanks for such valuable insights

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Trish Deenis, Counseling, USA says

So nice to hear it from an actual health care provider who worker in the trenches of it all. They played so many roles and they too will grapple with ongoing pain post covid.

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Sylvia Ingerson, Nursing, USA says

Nice to hear physician talk about effects on health care providers, their seeking help. Acknowledging effects and communicating, was not something I experiences as a young healthcare provider, but love that it is being done now and hopefully more often as time goes on.

Sylvia Ingerson PMH-NP, LADC

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Joseph Izzo, Social Work, Washington, DC, USA says

Dr. Ofri uses an appropriate metaphor for the health care doctors, nurses and others who are directly treating severely ill, COVID-19 patients. It is/was a “War Zone”. I thought of scenes from the TV show, M.A.S.H…….Helicopters flying in with dozens of severely wounded soldiers. The younger health professionals who missed the HIV/AIDS pandemic are unfamiliar with the feeling that no matter what you did, the person would die anyway. This current pandemic defies the doctor’s and nurses’ belief and training that their purpose is to treat and save their patients. When that becomes an impossibility, feelings of shame, stemming from the irrational belief that “I Didn’t do enough or the right procedure”, can lead to depression, in the short term, or PTSD in the long term. Mental health professionals will have to help these health professionals to confront and process their grief, sense of shame and failure as we continue to move through this awful pandemic.

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Lizzie Mack, Appleton, WI, USA says

I was a nurse, but also have an MSW. A number of weeks before I ever saw this mentioned it hit me like a truck: these folks are going to need therapy for their PTSD ‘after’ this is over. I then started noticing nurses and doctors in Covid ICU’s who were starting to cry/fall apart emotionally even as they were being interviewed. Everyone in a healthcare setting has seen/does see death, but never, ever, as often, so often as quickly, as they folks. It hits me so often thinking of and worrying about these professionals.

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Dilwara Tucker, Psychotherapy, GB says

Dr. Ofri I am deeply touched by the thoughtfulness and kindness in your very being and yet the professionalism in this presentation. You are a wonderful ambassador for all medical and nursing staff allowing insights in very harrowing and deeply moving situations. Thank you so very much.
I am a therapist in the Uk and previously, many years ago was an intensive care nurse. I see from both these perspectives the considerable differences between medical and social care cultures which invisibly train their respective staff into their very different professional journeys. There is so much to learn from each other.
I am so sorry hospital and community staff around the world have had to hold both the expert care and witnessing of so many people who were ill and suffering from this dreadful virus , I send them all much love and wish them deep healing in whatever form that takes for them. Blessings.

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Marcia Harms, Marriage/Family Therapy, Bainbridge Island, WA, USA says

This was an awesome presentation by someone on the frontlines. Sincerely appreciate your sharing the interview. Thanks. Working today with frontline workers from their own historical profession has been helpful.

Our collective past is always on my mind with so many who, from a silent traumatic environment, were abused in early childhood, suffering the repercussions. Today’s pandemic causes those recurring feelings of helplessness and hopelessness.

Many who have suffered abuse seem to have an ability to persevere dispite todays chaos. Our own neuroception was alive and well in early childhood. In todays new understanding of neuroscience we can tap that realization, helping move humanity forward. Bringing it to the person’s awareness helps remind them of that strength they have always had. See it daily in those who need support. Helping them see they already have deep understanding.

Frequent work is imperative. Healing thoughts will project us into future repair work using all the tools our own training and NICABM still impart to the mental health community for the good of humanity.

Thanks again, we need you more than ever before as we pass the baton to others. Please thank Dr. Ofri for this heartwarming presentation and wish her a healthy future.

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Anonymous, Counseling, CA says

Excellent insightful, candid, and heartfelt. Helping us to understand we all have abilities as well as limitations in doing our best to serve the most vulnerable needs through this COVID Crisis. Showing patience, kindness, and understanding in caring for the needs of the most vulnerable take hard work, determination, and much courage.

Retired Social Worker

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Pat Wilkie, Scandia, MN, USA says

Liked the ideas about art and ambiguity in treatment of physical and mental illness.

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Janice Arlene Rost, Psychotherapy, Briarcliff Manor, NY, USA says

Dr Ofri shared a very moving narrative. It’s the little things we second guess, yet what’s quite certain is that these Angels of Mercy will get a paycheck and they will also get guilt, a virus like infection. No matter how hard, how long or the part played, this debilitating burden comes with the territory and rests on the shoulders of these health care workers. May they find support to lessen their load, for the next patients, and also for their own Self care – they surely deserve to feel they did their best and it is appreciated.

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- Anonymous, Counseling, USA says
  
  Thanks for you input here. That is good reminder for all the line staff in these hospitals.
  
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Sherry Hubbard, Marriage/Family Therapy, Bellevue, NE, USA says

It is warming to hear that a provider would even think or care about things like home-made bracelets in such a time of medical crisis. The sense of caring about the identify of a patient seems to be what makes a provider qualified to provide real comfort to a family in the event of their loved-one’s death.

My hope would be that it would offer comfort to the provider, too, that they held, in honor, the person within the patient, along side the grief that they were unable to keep them alive. This disease will be deadly to some no matter what, but to be fully present to a particular human life in the midst of their battle is valuable.

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Gregg, Another Field, Ellicott City , MD, USA says

Thank you.

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Lauren S., Psychology, Seattle , WA, USA says

Thank you this was really excellent. I’m a psychologist working in an academic medical center where all of this has been ever present and front line providers are really needing support.

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Alice LoCicero, Psychology, El Cerrito, CA, USA says

For ALL who work in health care settings (broadly defined) in California, there is a FREE and completely CONFIDENTIAL dedicated support line available. It’s offered by a partnership between Alameda County Psychological Association and Crisis Support Services of Alameda County. Those volunteering on this line have been trained in issues specific to those working in health care during this time. Please call. We have capacity to listen, and empathize. 510-420-3222

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Ilene Frommer, Marriage/Family Therapy, Healdsburg, CA, USA says

I want to send this to my primary care physician who is also a teaching doctor. Danielle Ofri was so empathetic with her stories and thoughts about how this pandemic will effect nurses, doctors, etc. and I hope he can share this talk. Thanks for posting for us.

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Barbara Polland, Marriage/Family Therapy, Los Angeles, CA, USA says

Dr. Ofri really offers ‘straight talk.’ She has such a nice and honest manner and self-disclosed one of her regrets about the bracelets she cut off the swollen wrist of a woman with a fever that had risen to 108 degrees. She didn’t know it was possible to have such a high fever from Covid-19. The woman died and everyone who hears Dr. Ofri speak will never forget where she had tucked the bracelets and what she so regrets. As a Mental Health Practitioner I will share this story with clients. All of us, with help, will learn to live with our own inevitable regrets.
B.K. Polland Ph.D., M.F.T. CA
Thank you for this rare listening opportunity Dr. Buczynski

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Joyce Decluett, Psychotherapy, Cleveland, OH, USA says

Health care workers are experiencing trauma. There seems to be a since of powerlessness. They are forming implicit memories that could cause flashbacks in the future. This gave an insight into how they are separated from those in society who are not sharing their experience. That has to be difficult as America reopens without knowing what our health care workers are experiencing. Thank you for sharing this.

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David Galloway, Psychotherapy, Atlanta, GA, USA says

“Time” is the coin of the realm in a crisis. I have been preaching to clinicians to find time to pause, be mindful, take care of themselves during breaks. My doctors and nurse all looked at me like I was an idiot. There is no time. I get it but I know that I am also right.
Now that we are in a bit of space where we can pause, we need to find ways to build the architecture for pause in the day. Encouraging, or being transparent to one’s own ways of taking care of oneself, i.e. seeing your shrink, meditating, listening to music, reading poetry is a way to promote self care. This is especially true for novice healthcare workers who are not experienced in the intensity, pace, and numbers of death. Grabbing, making time to discuss the experience is a value that will pay off. I have encouraged out staff to build in such paused into their normal huddles. This is our responsibility of leadership to make this happen, or at least provide the opportunities.

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Andrea Bernard, Psychology, Encinitas, CA, USA says

Beautiful! That’s what a humanistic, wholistic physician looks like…inspiring!

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Stephanie Gutz, Social Work, NM, USA says

Thank you for this perspective of what front line health care providers are experiencing.
We have been listening to a lot of live music online while staying home. I realized last night that music seems to be healing medicine for so many these days. Wouldn’t it be a lovely plot twist if the importance of the arts would be recognized and better funded after this pandemic.

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Annette Ladowitz, Social Work, Saratoga, CA, USA says

Dr. Ofri was fantastic. Very clear, and easy to relate to her experiences. I particularly valued the sharing of the personal experience re the patient who died and whose bracelets were left. Thank you for showing the humanity we miss too often in a world that values academics and control over acknowledging fears, vulnerability and uncertainty.
Annette Ladowitz LCSW

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Anonymous says

excellent and thank you for making this available. Very informative and insightful for preparing for listening to an HCW’s internal experience.

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Kathy Scott, USA says

Appreciated the clarity and story about the bracelets.
And this:
“We want evidence-based medicine. But real people and real conditions are ambiguous. That is very unsettling. And we don’t get much training in how to deal with ambiguity. Turn to the arts to help.”

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Michele Stamper, Marriage/Family Therapy, CA, USA says

Wow thank you for this! Helps to have a sense of what it has been like for our healthcare workers. I imagined but now feel a little more connected to what they have been dealing with. It helped for her to bring up the divide of experience for the health care world and everyone else. I loved her insight to the arts and processing of trauma

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Kay Frances Schepp, Psychology, Burlington , VT, USA says

Inclusion of all health care providers, whatever our specific roles, illustrates the human connection. Whether a newly graduated nurse, a pediatric surgeon or a
mental health counselor, our personal stresses are similar during Covid -19. Thank you.
Kay Frances Schepp,
Psychologist

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josé alfaro, Psychotherapy, NYC, NY, USA says

I’ve organized therapists to provide therapy for NYC nurses for free but we’ve only gotten a few requests. I hypothesize that it’s because the nurses are so busy that they don’t even dare to turn their attention to their mental health needs. It would be helpful if there were more medical professionals speaking out about the need for emotional support. Eventually we expect the need to explode.
José Alfaro, LCSW

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Virginia Wilson, Psychotherapy, Slidell , LA, USA says

This was so powerful. As a therapist I have felt somewhat powerless to understand the enormity of what a healthcare goes through because they are not talking openly about it. I will now be more present and prompt more when talking about COVID 19. Thank you

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Rachel Garst, Coach, USA says

Excellent video. Anyone working with health professionals should watch this. The most moving is when she speaks of the mental health distress caused by being isolated in your perception. (“No one else sees this, but me.”). She also speaks of the role of art (with its ambiguity) to help in processing the intense emotions generated in the process of trying to save dying people.

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John Kavanaugh says

I can’t walk this walk
Without paying attention
To other voices.

Front line experience and vulnerability like this makes it easier to enable me, my clients, my friends to share their worries and care.

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Joanie Piken, USA says

Excellent and really well outlined and covered. When in survival mode and not know one is in that phase, processing this is hard for most.

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Will Utz, Psychotherapy, Geneva, IL, USA says

This was the most insightful and helpful reflection I’ve encountered so far on what it’s like for medical professionals who are caring for the sick and dying during this pandemic. Thank God for Dr. Ofri and her colleagues at Bellevue Hospital, and all those engaged in direct and indirect care of Covid-19 patients and their family members.

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Judy Hanazawa, Social Work, CA says

Thank you for this enlightening piece. It taught the impossible dilemma placed upon the HCW of being in the midst of multiple dying and needing to respond accordingly, while recognizing the profound experience that dying is for each human. This piece taught that HCWs were weighed down by feeling inadequate while doing as much as possible giving treatment. It was also difficult to witness patients who did not have the support of family closeby as they passed. They were also aware of their own isolation being witness to the passing of so many souls, and so separated from the world outside which was focused on covid 19 statistics. These were incredible circumstances beyond their control and in offering therapy, it’s important to express appreciation for their significant efforts while giving support in a situation their control. Support them in their grief for those who died and their families, yet provide a reality check and affirmation they did all they could. Also support them to recognize emotional effects of the isolation they experienced and ultimately, give support to permit themselves to lift the crushing weight they placed upon themselves.

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Lisa Rotella, Social Work, USA says

Excellent perspective. Thank you for sharing.

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Sharon Parkinson, Psychology, Naples, FL, USA says

I can not express how much I appreciate Dr. Ofri sharing her personal experience with COVID in an area as hard hit as NYC. Her description of it as the “AIDS epidemic combined with Hurricane Sandy“ really illustrated her experience very well. Those of us in southern Florida have been extremely lucky to have not experienced the full force of this pandemic, but can definitely understand her Hurricane example. I would love to hear more personal accounts from the frontlines.

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Lynn Ber, Psychotherapy, Keene, NH, USA says

This was a beautiful, helpful, non-shaming talk about what doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers are facing on the frontlines, emotionally. I would emphasize that the experience of grief In all it’s manifestations (the regret over losing the patient’s bracelets) is very important to acknowledge. Grief is experienced in many ways emotionally. As mental health professionals we need to help traumatized staff be able to have their sadness, regret, anger, guilt, etc. that they experience. We need to help them normalize whatever emotions they are having and help them cope with their emotions. The use of art, music, writing, etc. that Danielle talked about is also a vital outlet for expression of those emotions. Bravo.

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Denise Morett, Psychology, USA says

Extremely accurate and honest reflection of exactly what’s happened and continues.
I’m in NYS and treating nurses, doctors and others working on front lines. It’s like a tsunami wave. May we be well. May mental heath providers also walk the walk and take care of their own mental health. We are in a marathon and need the highest levels of support and care for ourselves and one another.

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Leslie Gillespie, Psychotherapy, CA says

Thank you so very very much. This was told With such poignancy and sincerity. I felt the tenderness of the bracelet removal and recognize the struggle of a helper’s brain and heart in overthinking about the woven jewellery‘s best place to land. Maybe under the bed was “just right” because all the memories and meaning of the bracelets could stay with her as long as possible. I loved the gentle reminder that despite our roles we all need support…no stigma.

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Catherine, Counseling, GB says

I found Danielle’s personal account very frank and insightful. As a member of the public I am even more indebted to Healthcare staff. I think people complaining about lockdown might find this humbling and perhaps grateful they are in lockdown and not a patient with Covid or a healthcare worker trying to save them and comfort them in the absence of family.
As a therapist, I thank Danielle for the insights which have given me greater understanding of the psychological turmoil experienced by those on the frontline and also non frontline medical staff. This video goes a long way in preparing me to support healthcare workers as they struggle with the aftermath of Covid as well as the ongoing threat. This account is also helpful for supporting clients who have lost family/friends to Covid.
Huge thanks to Danielle.

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Margaret Jordan, Psychotherapy, GB says

My biggest takeaway:
Having experienced/witnessed serious & terminal illness in relatives, my sense from this video is that medical staff were prevented from holding their usual emotionally aloof stance. They were pulled into having to experience the kind of emotion that relatives feel when witnessing their seriously ill and/or dying relatives. I can identify with the sense of loneliness & isolation described here. I think this experience may well mean that medics in future become more humane, compassionate and less emotionally aloof in their approach hen relating to families. In that sense there is post traumatic growth to be had.

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