Page 2 - Top Nurses 2021

On an early March weekend in
2020, Montgomery County’s first COVID-19 patient walked through the doors of Einstein Medical Center Montgomery complaining of upper respiratory symptoms.
His nurse contacted AnnMarie Papa with this question: “My patient is COVID positive. What do I do?”
More than a year later, healthcare executives are still struggling. Although vaccines provide a ray of hope, Papa and her colleagues worry that people will relax mask wearing and other safety precautions, leading to a second wave. “Or are we on the third wave or fifth? I can’t keep track,” says Papa, EMCM’s vice president and its chief nursing officer.
The pandemic has buried nurses under an an avalanche of short- and long-term psychological symptoms. “Nothing in
my career compares to this,” says Angela Coladonato, senior vice president and chief nursing officer at Chester County Hospital. “I’ve seen more burnout and moral distress among nurses than ever before.”
Papa sees “a thick brew of despair,
frustration, tremendous sorrow, fear and anger—and, yes, exhaustion.”
Numbers testify to the pandemic’s devastation in Chester, Montgomery and Delaware counties. At press time, Chester County Hospital had treated 1,066 COVID patients, a number that peaked with 52 cases in a day.
Main Line Health’s Lankenau Medical Center and Bryn Mawr, Paoli and Riddle hospitals treated more than 12,000 patients. At the peak of the pandemic, 280 patients were treated in one day— and it happened twice.
Lankenau and Riddle had the highest numbers of COVID cases and the most deaths. “At Riddle, many patients came from congregant living, like nursing homes,” says Barbara Wadsworth, Main Line Health’s chief nursing officer, chief operating officer and executive vice president. “Lankenau has the sickest and most acute patients.”
It’s much the same at EMCM, where more than 4,000 COVID patients were treated. Underlying health conditions in Norristown’s medically underserved
community made residents prime targets for COVID. During the height of the crisis, EMCM had 13 COVID patients on ventilators at the same time. “I’ve been a nurse for over 40 years, and I’ve never seen anything like this,” says Papa. “Some people came in with a sniffle, then died.”
During the peak of the pandemic, one nurse told Wadsworth a story she’ll never forget: “She said, ‘I didn’t have any patients to give to the next nurse on duty. All of my COVID patients died.’”
But it’s not just the number of deaths— it’s the way in which COVID patients die. Due to mitigation restrictions, patients are alone in hospitals, usually connected to ventilators and unresponsive. In their last days of cognition, they may have virtual visits with family members. “It’s better
than nothing,” Coladonato says. “But not having family and friends by your side when you’re sick and scared is very difficult for the patient and the loved ones.”
Papa puts it plainly: “A COVID death is a terrible death.”
Even non-terminal continued on page 39
36 May 2021 | www.mainlinetoday.com
SPECIAL EDITORIAL SECTION
HERE TO
SERVE
Nurses may be pandemic heroes, but COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on their mental health and changed the profession—perhaps forever. Our five nursing legends survey the damage from the frontlines.
By Melissa Jacobs | Photos by Tessa Marie Images