Posted 29 мая 2020,, 07:55

Published 29 мая 2020,, 07:55

Modified 24 декабря 2022,, 22:37

Updated 24 декабря 2022,, 22:37

Mordovian coronavirus nightmare: a story of a nurse from Saransk that is hard to believe

Mordovian coronavirus nightmare: a story of a nurse from Saransk that is hard to believe

29 мая 2020, 07:55
Фото: vk.com
A resuscitation nurse in Mordovia contracted a coronavirus in April. After a confirmed analysis, she was taken out of the red zone by ambulance and sent home for the self-treatment. As a result, the whole family became infected, and her grandmother was already buried.

The next day, the doctor was forced to return to work, threatening a 300,000 fine.

Julia Suntsova

Patients with external symptoms of coronavirus began to be admitted to the Republican Clinical Hospital No. 4 of the Republic of Mordovia in April. Despite this, doctors and medical staff were sent to work without special protection, since the institution was not assigned the status of a COVID hospital.

At the same time, the red zone in the medical institution was still organized. Quarantined physicians have been living and working in the building for two weeks, not in contact with the outside world. But as soon as the outbreak began, doctors and sisters began to be taken to general queues for CT at another clinic, and then released on receipt for home self-isolation.

Hospital No. 4 achieved a “covert” status and the allocation of funds for protection only after half of the corps employees became seriously ill and the funeral in families began.

But still nurses and doctors are forced to go to work even with cough and fever. Coronavirus hit regions hard...

- On the morning of April 22, I worked the night shift and returned home. Contacted with parents who have been sitting in recent months with a child. My son is 6 years old, I am raising a child alone. At that time it was already rumored that the entire hospital should be quarantined. Before that, two floors had already been let home, only cardiology, hematology and we, the Resuscitation and Intensive Care Unit (ICU), were left to work.

Officially, our hospital did not work with coronavirus. We were not told that those who were in intensive care had COVID-19, so we went out to them without special protection and carried out all the manipulations with our bare hands - there were simply no funds available, they were not purchased. But a few days later, the first results of smears in patients began to come - the coronavirus was confirmed time after time, says Elena Petrova.

One by one, the doctors themselves began to become ill.

At 8 a.m. on April 22, the nurse returned home, and after a few hours the managers phoned her and ordered them to pack their things and return to work at the already closed hospital. In a medical institution where the red zone has been operating for a month, they finally officially announced quarantine.

- The senior nurse and the acting head of the department called, they said that I had several hours for training. In a day I will work and live there in a closed zone. The day before, I already realized that I had become infected. She made an X-ray for herself - he showed that the roots of the bronchi are dilated. The temperature and cough began to rise. I didn’t refuse to work, I asked only to give me at least a little recover to go back to the sick, ”says Elena.

The nurse called the therapist home, describing the symptoms. But at 15 o’clock in the afternoon they called her again from her native hospital, this time with threats.

The management told the nurse that the therapist’s call to her house had been canceled, that she didn’t get the sick leave anyway, and they were not waiting for her anywhere else but her hospital as a contact.

“Come back, otherwise we will call you to the police, and there will be a fine of 300 thousand. You will become famous throughout Saransk as a nurse who escaped from quarantine, we will write him in deserters and dismiss him according to the article. You won’t be with the child in any case, we will separate you, ”the nurse reports the conversation with the administration.

Under pressure, Elena Petrova returned to the hospital and worked for several more days. The disease progressed. Cough intensified over the past few days, weakness appeared, and at night the temperature rose to 38.6. Similar symptoms began to appear in other employees.

On April 29, the results of the analyzes came - Elena Petrova confirmed COVID-19.

On April 30, the administration sent her and an infected nurse with things to the ambulance in general to the clinic number 5 on Himmash and ordered not to return.

- Since April 22 we have been working in a closed zone, from which no one was let out anywhere. Relatives even brought parcels to us and left them at the doors under the back door. This is understandable - our doctors, staff, and almost all of our patients confirmed covid. But as soon as the temperature rose, for some reason, it became easy for us to be sent to a general clinic to another clinic, knowing that we had direct contact with cove-positive patients! Why it was impossible to pack us in protective suits and make a CT, separating the polyclinic from the rest of the visitors, and even from the paramedics, this is not clear. Then, with a high temperature, I no longer really realized that a terrible thing was happening. Why, then, did we generally live in the red zone before this fortnight? In general, with all the other patients, we sat in the end from 11 am to 5 pm! This is the most terrible thing. And in the future, all of our infected doctors were also sent to these general lines. And we are still calmly being called up for admission to the hospital at the place of residence. Is it quarantine?

CT scan revealed a 12-percent lung lesion, bilateral pneumonia, and “frosted glass” in Elena. When asked about hospitalization, the therapist replied that with such low rates no one would put her in a bed - “there are no places” and, having asked to sign an obligation to isolate themselves, they sent them home (!) Under their own power. The girl sent her parents home, and left the child with her.

- After two, my dad’s temperature rose, and on May 7 it became sharply worse for me. I could not catch my breath, there was a high temperature, asked my dad to take me to the hospital. The therapist wrote out the second direction on CT, and again I waited for him in general lines, lost consciousness - now in hospital No. 3”, - says Elena.

The examination showed 24 percent lung damage. She was again denied hospitalization, sending herself home for treatment. On that day, his father’s temperature rose to 39. The examination, the next day, showed him a 20% lung lesion and bilateral pneumonia with suspected COVID-19. The elderly man was also denied hospitalization, saying that with such percentages he was sent home.

It was not possible for Mom to get a referral for CT due to the absence of visible symptoms. On May 11, a woman took a paid shot that revealed a 5 percent lung lesion, right-sided viral pneumonia with suspected COVID-19. The sick leave for the woman was knocked out with a fight, the doctors did not want to listen about hospitalization, despite the concomitant diabetes mellitus and fever.

Elena Petrova had to treat her mother herself by writing the same medicines that she treated her patients from the pharmacy.

On May 15, Mom’s condition worsened, she began to choke.

- For a week, therapist never came to her, no one listened to her, did not take tests, did not examine at all. In the morning it became very bad, my mother was taken to a CT scan, which already revealed a 63 percent lung lesion. She was placed in intensive care, but her condition worsened, then she was transferred to mechanical ventilation, and on May 21, her mother died.

My father by this time, lung damage reached 36% - it was difficult to get a place in the hospital with difficulty.

After her mother passed away, Elena asked her six-year-old son to be examined completely. I went to the clinic where the child is attached, called the Ministry of Health, the head of Mordovia and all kinds of hotlines.

The boy also began to cough, his throat, stomach ached, he vomited. A smear test negative for coronavirus, so the doctors refused all further examinations.

The arguments that the child was constantly living in a family where everyone fell ill - mother, grandfather and grandmother, who had already died, were not convinced by local administrators.

It turned out that the authorities of the hospital where Elena worked did not submit data on the work of her employees in the red zone and on constant contact with coronavirus patients. Thus, the grounds for the surveys of the workers and their families did not arise.

- On the hot line of the Ministry of Health, they told me that there was no evidence that I was in direct contact with the infected people, I worked in the red zone in any Registry, and therefore they can’t appoint additional examinations. The minimum smear was prescribed to the child only after my call to the head of the region, ”the nurse says.

Now Elena Petrova and her son are still at home on self-isolation. Are treated independently, improvised means and at their own expense. The woman says that she is feeling better; she no longer faints. But in a telephone conversation with a NI correspondent, coughing attacks over and over again overcome her anyway.

Elderly dad is in the hospital. It was possible to stop the defeat of the lungs, and it keeps at around 36.5%.

Elena's mother did an autopsy, which confirmed the coronavirus, but this diagnosis in the pathological conclusion is not at number 1.

- First comes pneumonia, then diabetes mellitus, and only then the postscript “complicated by coronavirus infection”. The coronavirus does not fall into the statistics that the Republic of Mordovia daily sends to the federal headquarters, although nothing was left from the lungs - more than 90% of the defeat. In the magazine of the hospital mortuary, my mother was 93rd. Only 114 people and everyone has COVID-19 and everyone is not the first number, so these people didn’t get into statistics like those who died from covid, ”says Elena.

On May 28, 2020, according to official data from the government of Mordovia, 12 people died from a coronavirus in the republic.

Although the woman died, as regional authorities allegedly alleged from diabetes, and not from COVID, the usual funeral was not allowed for the family.

- The closed coffin. The body is not worn, packaged in plastic, sprinkled with bleach and lime. They’re not allowed to the coffin. Relatives stood for many meters. They buried it quickly and only then allowed to approach the grave. In the ritual office they still forced to pay extra for the burial of the covoid patient, ”says Elena.

In the building of the Republican Clinical Hospital No. 4 GBUZ, where the nurse worked, she said that more than half of the doctors became infected.

- A corpse was taken out of the neighboring hematology unit. We have contracted a nurse, a nurse. Nurse Tatyana Kanaykina died. The head nurse of the hematological department confirmed the covid. The department head until the last remained in the red zone and also fell ill, then we. The doctor from the 5th clinic has 40% lung damage, he is in intensive care. Many continue to work with pneumonia, - the interlocutor of "NI" told.

After the outbreak, the hospital was finally given the status of a “cobby” hospital, but there are still not enough workers, special protection and ventilation devices, the remaining employees pass from the “front”.

The sick, even the doctors themselves, are still hanging on hot lines for hours and often cannot get the help they need.

After the hopelessness of Elena Petrova told about her tragedy in a local group in vkontakte, the Minister of Health of Mordovia Oleg Markin apologized to the nurse "for his colleagues" and said that "their role in this story will be analyzed." But the only consequence of this promise was that her father finally had a second CT scan done. Otherwise, the situation with the fight against the virus in the region has not changed much.

- I have been working in the hospital for 10 years, I came right after studying. And what is the result? I'm sick, dad - in the hospital, my mother lost. No payments, no help, nothing. I can’t reach anyone. Why condole our loss if our caring state cannot provide any help to the living? How can quarantine be removed when the number of cases grows at an incredible speed and the hospitals fail? Where to go, whom to write, to take control of the situation? I would not wish the enemy what happened to my family.

According to Elena, when at the beginning of the epidemic she realized that her medical institution was not ready to receive coronavirus patients, then, fearing for the lives of her parents and her baby, she asked the management to dismiss her. But she was told that they could be released only under a bad article, and she remained. Elena Petrova continues to fight for the life and health of herself, her father and child.

Novye Izvestia sent an information request to the head physician of the Republican Clinical Hospital No. 4 of the Republic of Mordovia Alexander Burlakov.

State Duma Deputy Oleg Shein sent materials to the Prosecutor General’s Office to investigate the causes of criminal negligence against doctors and hospital staff.

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