RMO Day 11 - On Call — Daily Dose of Chemo

My stylus was left by the isolation ward counter. Ended up being bagged as biohazard.

Finally, I had to be on call during the Movement Restriction Order and to be honest, the cases were lesser, although the ER was busy with people coming to have COVID test done. The hospital built a special tent area outside the ER to accommodate them, and also to ensure there suspected cases would be assessed at the tent rather than jeopardising the running of the hospital.

Some patients were advised to defer admission while waiting for their COVID those results to come back. While those who needed hospitalisation were taken not a special ward after the swabs were taken.

This group of patients, termed Persons Under Investigations (PUI), will be isolated with all handlers using Personal Protective Equipment when dealing with them. Once their results came back negative, they would be transferred out from this isolation area, and it would be back to business as usual for them.

Unfortunately, yesterday being a Saturday, I had to wait for an extra 24 hours for the results to come back as PCR was not run on Sundays. I also limit my interactions with them as each time I go in, I had to don the protective gears, risking myself and staffs at the same time.

Rather than using my usual, bigger Ecco, I decided to go with my hiking shoes instead

The patients were also not allowed visitors, which to be quite honest can be a plus point. I had been in situations before where it took longer to deal with relatives than sorting out the patient problems. To clarify any history, we can just pick up the phone and talk to them then.

The challenge I had with the suit was the difficulty to fit in my shoes as the shoe covers were somewhat fragile and small. It was also not exactly moisture-proof, with my socks ending up soaking wet in the tent. For later, I would be wearing my hiking shoes. Smaller and water-proof hopefully. My glasses also kept fogging up with the full suit on. Therefore, I would be putting a plaster over my nose to seal my mask so that the moisture would no go up to my eyes. I ended up going in without my glasses on that day. Auscultating was also a challenge since we use the stethoscope provided, which do not usually fit snugly to the ears. And with a layer of fabric in between, to get the angle just right took some fiddling.

On the whole, I learned a lot yesterday. The call itself was not a busy one, with no admission after midnight. Hopefully, my PUIs would turn out to be COVID-negative, and we can get on with the treatment.