Editor’s note: The Gazette is working on a series profiling health care workers on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. We’re trying to reach doctors, respiratory therapists, environmental service workers, certified nurse assistants and others. Please let us know if you would like to connect at newsroom@gazettenet.com.
Claps, whistles and the banging of pots and pans can be heard in New York City at 7 p.m. each evening, when residents take to their porches, fire escapes and open windows to recognize the people who are working on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In western Massachusetts, Baystate Medical Center in Springfield and other hospitals in the Baystate system also have a celebratory ritual, says emergency room doctor Sundeep Shukla. It includes cheers and claps — and the theme song from “Rocky,” the 1976 movie starring Sylvester Stallone as the eponymous underdog boxer.
“We have an overhead prompt that says ‘Code Rocky’ to let us know a patient who was diagnosed with COVID-19 is going to be wheeled out of the hospital,” said Shukla, who also goes by “Sunny.”
The Baystate communications system also notifies employees via text when there’s a Code Rocky to celebrate. “The entire staff that is available will physically distance themselves and clap, which is a pretty amazing experience,” said Shukla. “It shows us that what we are doing really makes a difference.”
He added, “It’s pretty emotional for the patient — and for the staff as well.”
The patients are fighters, and so are the doctors — “relentless” is how Shukla describes the supply-chain team at Baystate Health. That team recently tracked down a shipment of much-needed personal protective equipment (PPE), encountering the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI along the way.
Although he feels he has the PPE he needs, Shukla does have other concerns about COVID-19 as an emergency room doctor who works at Baystate Medical Center, Baystate Noble Hospital and Baystate Franklin Medical Center. At Baystate Franklin, he is both a doctor and the associate medical director of the emergency department.
“I think first responders and emergency room doctors are all concerned about if we’re going to get [COVID-19] and transmit it to the rest of our family,” said Shukla, who lives in Northampton with his wife, Deepika, and two kids, Deven, 6, and Riya, 3. “It’s something we think about on a daily basis,” he said of medical workers. “We all took an oath to help protect our community, and our community is really, really important to us … In that sense, we feel like it’s our duty to help people when they need assistance.”
In mid-March, as fears about COVID-19 grew in the U.S., Shukla spoke with Deepika about his will and what would be his last wishes. On Sunday morning, he put some of these thoughts into an email to the Gazette: “Emergency medicine physicians are writing good-bye letters to their children, updating their wills, composing postdated letters to spouses, and letting family know of their last wishes,” he wrote. “This is because we have already lost multiple colleagues from other hospitals due to COVID-19. These difficult conversations have become front and center for us, regardless of age or health.”
In the emergency room, his days are draining. “Every day is a challenge because we’re seeing different degrees of patients on a regular basis,” he said. For example, doctors and nurses see patients in critical condition with COVID-19 who need a breathing tube. “The next minute, you’re seeing someone with a fracture,” he said. “You’re having to flip a lot, which is typical ER work … It’s been exhausting and challenging at the same time.”
But everything is relative. “I think we’re lucky in the sense that we’re not in the situation that New York City is in right now,” he said, but, “that could happen here. We’re all taking the precautions in regards to being able to care for a surge of patients.”
Though the number of COVID-19 patients has increased in Massachusetts, and he is seeing sicker people, Shukla said emergency rooms around the state are seeing fewer total patients than it did before the pandemic. “I think people are doing a good job of staying home,” he said. “But what I want to tell the community is we are ready to serve anyone who needs a medical evaluation. What we don’t want is for people having a potential heart attack or stroke to stay home. That can be detrimental.”
He thinks of it this way: It’s not just the doctors and nurses who are responsible for protecting public health. “I think that all of us are health care workers right now,” Shukla said. “Just by staying home, there’s a good likelihood that you’re saving someone’s life who you don’t know.”
Greta Jochem can be reached at gjochem@gazettenet.com.