Opinion

SKAI in the ICU of “Sotiria”: The shocking stories of patients and the battle of doctors |

by

One year has passed since the operation of the multifunctional ICU of “Sotiria”, a unit built with fast track procedures at the expense of the Greek Parliament, to meet the needs of the NSS in the midst of an outbreak of the pandemic and today doctors and nurses continue to provide daily battle.

SKAI and Antonis Kritikos entered the ICU of the hospital and talked to the first line doctors.

“Within a year, we have treated 690 patients in the Multipurpose ICU of Sotiria. Almost throughout this year our occupancy exceeded 80% and for many weeks we reached 100%. Today we have just one empty bed. We have treated the whole range of ages which means that no one is invulnerable. We recently had a 19-year-old patient and we also had a 104-year-old patient. Others with underlying diseases, others without any subject. This virus does not discriminate “, says the director of the ICU of Sotiria, Mary Daganou.

She says she is shocked by how much damage the virus does to the lungs. “It simply came to our notice then. It hardens the lung, makes it reinforced concrete. “Even the respirator can not oxygenate them,” he notes.

The patients who passed many. The stories from each one … countless. Patient 19 years old, father with son in the same unit … mother and father together in the battle of the intensive care unit.

“Great hospitalizations of patients, many days, many medicines and always the doctor in the unit fights with the highest percentage against the patient. Every win for the sick is a won battle for us. Many succeed and win, but some lose. And this will continue because this is life, this is the unit “, says the intensive care specialist and curator of the First Multipurpose ICU of Sotiria, Christos Deboneras.

Today, the intubated patients in the new ICU of Sotiria are over 95% unvaccinated …

“There are a lot of problems with the unvaccinated. It is overwhelming. We have taken patients around 20, 30. Their axial ones are tragic “, explains Mr. Deboneras.

“It has happened that whole families are happy here. At the moment we have an androgynous inside. Father and son … It is very difficult when you have bad news to tell relatives. Vaccines are currently 95% in the unit. “The vaccinated people we have in the unit are either very old or with serious underlying diseases or people who were vaccinated 8 months ago, which shows us how necessary the booster dose is,” Ms. Daganou points out.

Doctors and nurses in the unit, become a family for the patients … And something more.

“We had a 19-year-old patient here. The mother was outside our ICU in the car 24 hours a day and she was waiting for us to go out and tell her good news “, says the nurse, Maria Pagoni.

For her part, the nurse Marina Matsiko emphasizes that “patients only have us. It is very difficult when a patient ends up whose relatives can not even come to see him, to say goodbye for the last time “.

And the door of the ICU may be closed, but the fight between doctors, nurses and patients against covid does not stop.

“This project, that is, to operate this ICU within 60 days and save lives, was successful due to the hard work done by all agencies, doctors, nurses … we worked hard and endless days” concludes its Director Unit.

.

coronavirusdoctorsICUnewspatientsSalvationskai

You May Also Like

Recommended for you