A young doctor shares her experience and learnings working in a COVID ward

English transcript | نسخة عربية

Occupation: Doctor
Date of interview: 25 August 2020
Language of interview: English

When the virus hit, Sarah, a doctor on a Covid ward, was scared. No one knew how the virus spread, or which treatment protocols might be effective. Wearing the physical protective equipment (PPE) was terrible—you could barely communicate with patients, plus there was the accompanying discomfort of the masks cutting into skin, and fogging eye lenses. Every night Sarah returned home, wearing her mask, and would head directly to her bedroom. She would shut herself in and her family left her meals by the door, to avoid being infected. Despite her worries about her family’s safety, the solitude allowed her to recover from working in the Covid wards. In March, she and her colleagues thought they might be in wards for one or two months, not realizing it would go on for almost six months, with no vacations and frequently working 12-14 hour shifts when short-staffed. 

Growing up in Kuwait, Sarah always believed this was a rich country, with few people suffering from poor living conditions. She never realized there were so many migrant worker communities living in difficult situations. Suddenly, working in the Covid wards in the field hospitals in lockdown areas, she began to see another Kuwait that had been invisible to her in her life of private schools, affluent neighborhoods and medical school abroad. In these wards, Sarah could only be with a patient for five minutes at a time, because of the large numbers of patients and the need to limit her exposure to the virus. Even in those short visits she began to learn things—people suffering from Covid were still grateful to be in the field hospital because at least they had food. She was shocked that her sick patients, alone without friends or family in a foreign country, with a potentially life-threatening illness, in a field hospital, would still rather be there than in their own apartments, healthy but hungry. Just having meals was enough. She realized some of her patients lived in one-bedroom apartments with 20 other people, so COVID would spread easily. She began to look at the nurses, the hospital porters, the cleaners and wonder about their salaries and their living and working conditions. As a doctor, she had always respected the nurses but had never had a conversation about their lives out of work. For the first time she felt it was ok, no, even necessary to inquire about the nurses’ and porters’ well-being, their salaries, their health and access to food, in case they needed help. The nurses were the most exposed to COVID, and she realized at the beginning that porters and cleaners were not provided PPEs. She was seeing everything differently. Although she believes the Ministry was doing a good job treating all patients fairly in terms of medical tests and treatment, COVID was exposing bigger issues related to the care and well-being of all low wage workers, but especially the day-wage worker community. She feels that there should be a balance between recognizing that expats have contributed to building the country, whilst guaranteeing that their livelihoods are being protected if they are brought into the country. 

Healthcare workers are burned out now, and she feels that there are deeper issues that need to be addressed, regarding the mental health and wellbeing of not only doctors, but also of nurses. Someone needs to speak up for them because their situation is the worst, and they cannot speak up themselves without fear of losing their jobs. Sarah has really learned a great deal as a doctor during this experience but also about the country.

In the clip above, Sarah shares her experience and learnings working as a doctor at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak.

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