After starting my nursing career in Emergency Departments (ED) and Cardiothoracics, it has been an honour to fly the world for the past 27 years as a freelance flight nurse. I’ve always considered myself lucky to be paid for having a weekly adventure.
At the beginning of March this year I found myself in Auckland, and I felt pretty desperate to get back home to the UK. In the days I had been away, repatriating a patient from Germany to their home in New Zealand, many countries had started closing their borders and the Coronavirus pandemic had truly been announced. I distinctly remember in each country I passed through on that journey, in every conversation I overhead, on every news channel I listened to, on every newspaper headline I saw, the sole topic was coronavirus.
During the SARS and MERS epidemics I have travelled continuously with work, but coronavirus felt different - the entire world appeared to be scared and if I’m honest, so was I. As a flight nurse you are often a sole practitioner and travel alone. On this final trip I felt especially alone; every medium was talking about coronavirus and I had no-one to talk to. I was elated when I finally landed at Heathrow Airport – I was home.
Little did I realise then, that my job and the entire travel industry would literally become non-existent overnight. I suddenly had to find a new nursing career. Having previously worked in ED I had maintained an informal contract at my local NHS Trust, working there as a Bank Nurse, and this is how I have found myself working back in ED during COVID-19.
At the beginning of the crisis I began a ‘COVID - Diary’ and I have subsequently recorded the events as the pandemic has evolved. From when the Army built temporary mortuary facilities in the grounds of the hospital, to having teaching sessions from the Palliative care team on end of life care; both brought the reality of the human toll from coronavirus to the fore, reduced me to tears and brought a lot of anxiety to the surface. At the time it seemed surreal and continues to at times, even though it has become the ‘new normal’. It is a world away from navigating a patient through airports across the world and I hope given time I can make sense of all of this in the future.
I have been tasked with working shifts in the Covid Assessment Unit, basically a Respiratory ED for patients with COVID-19 type symptoms. The Trust has managed this very effectively. The Unit is staffed by ED medics and nurses but is geographically located away from ED in an area usually reserved as the Private Patients Suite. Here there is easy access to x-ray and the ward block, and has enabled a seamless pathway for suspected COVID-19 Positive patients to enter into the hospital system.
The donning and doffing PPE brings back memories of the first days of AIDS/HIV patients when I worked in Theatres. I had forgotten how tiring it is to communicate whilst wearing it, although thankfully I haven’t had to endure it for long periods this time around; our colleagues in ICU are bearing that burden.
The patients who have passed through the unit have been varied and have usually been admitted to Covid wards within the hospital for treatment. There have been occasions where rapid life-saving intervention has been necessary, and patients have been transferred directly to ICU for mechanical ventilation. Sadly, there have also been those who have died soon after arriving. Breaking this news to relatives over the telephone is heartbreaking and will be one of the sad memories of COVID-19 that will stay with many of us personally and professionally for the rest of our lives. The images of frightened symptomatic patients coming into the unit are now embedded in my memory; I sincerely hope and pray these patients went home again.
My colleagues have been endlessly patient with me as I juggle and struggle caring for more than one patient at a time. As a flight nurse I am more used to nursing on a ‘one to one’ basis but I feel I am catching up with each shift (or at least I hope I am).
At this present time there are no plans to recommence leisure travel, so who knows when there will be a requirement for flight nurses again. I doubt I will be going to Auckland again anytime soon and I wonder if COVID-19 will mean that I will be ending my nursing career in the place I started it … in ED?
At the beginning of March this year I found myself in Auckland, and I felt pretty desperate to get back home to the UK. In the days I had been away, repatriating a patient from Germany to their home in New Zealand, many countries had started closing their borders and the Coronavirus pandemic had truly been announced. I distinctly remember in each country I passed through on that journey, in every conversation I overhead, on every news channel I listened to, on every newspaper headline I saw, the sole topic was coronavirus.
During the SARS and MERS epidemics I have travelled continuously with work, but coronavirus felt different - the entire world appeared to be scared and if I’m honest, so was I. As a flight nurse you are often a sole practitioner and travel alone. On this final trip I felt especially alone; every medium was talking about coronavirus and I had no-one to talk to. I was elated when I finally landed at Heathrow Airport – I was home.
Little did I realise then, that my job and the entire travel industry would literally become non-existent overnight. I suddenly had to find a new nursing career. Having previously worked in ED I had maintained an informal contract at my local NHS Trust, working there as a Bank Nurse, and this is how I have found myself working back in ED during COVID-19.
At the beginning of the crisis I began a ‘COVID - Diary’ and I have subsequently recorded the events as the pandemic has evolved. From when the Army built temporary mortuary facilities in the grounds of the hospital, to having teaching sessions from the Palliative care team on end of life care; both brought the reality of the human toll from coronavirus to the fore, reduced me to tears and brought a lot of anxiety to the surface. At the time it seemed surreal and continues to at times, even though it has become the ‘new normal’. It is a world away from navigating a patient through airports across the world and I hope given time I can make sense of all of this in the future.
I have been tasked with working shifts in the Covid Assessment Unit, basically a Respiratory ED for patients with COVID-19 type symptoms. The Trust has managed this very effectively. The Unit is staffed by ED medics and nurses but is geographically located away from ED in an area usually reserved as the Private Patients Suite. Here there is easy access to x-ray and the ward block, and has enabled a seamless pathway for suspected COVID-19 Positive patients to enter into the hospital system.
The donning and doffing PPE brings back memories of the first days of AIDS/HIV patients when I worked in Theatres. I had forgotten how tiring it is to communicate whilst wearing it, although thankfully I haven’t had to endure it for long periods this time around; our colleagues in ICU are bearing that burden.
The patients who have passed through the unit have been varied and have usually been admitted to Covid wards within the hospital for treatment. There have been occasions where rapid life-saving intervention has been necessary, and patients have been transferred directly to ICU for mechanical ventilation. Sadly, there have also been those who have died soon after arriving. Breaking this news to relatives over the telephone is heartbreaking and will be one of the sad memories of COVID-19 that will stay with many of us personally and professionally for the rest of our lives. The images of frightened symptomatic patients coming into the unit are now embedded in my memory; I sincerely hope and pray these patients went home again.
My colleagues have been endlessly patient with me as I juggle and struggle caring for more than one patient at a time. As a flight nurse I am more used to nursing on a ‘one to one’ basis but I feel I am catching up with each shift (or at least I hope I am).
At this present time there are no plans to recommence leisure travel, so who knows when there will be a requirement for flight nurses again. I doubt I will be going to Auckland again anytime soon and I wonder if COVID-19 will mean that I will be ending my nursing career in the place I started it … in ED?
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