AGIOS ATHANASIOS, Greece (AP) – What does a medical professional do when his wife and in-laws contract the disease at the center of a pandemic for several months?
Gabriel Tachtatzoglou, a critical care nurse, did not feel well about the treatment options available in Greece’s second largest city when his wife, both her parents and her brother went down with COVID-19. in November. Thessaloniki was among the areas in Greece with the most confirmed cases of coronavirus, and intensive care units in hospitals were filling up.
Tachtatzoglou, who had to be quarantined and could not go to work once his relatives tested positive for the virus, decided to use his experience in intensive care, taking care of himself.
This decision, says his family, probably saved their lives.
“If we had been to the hospital, I don’t know where we would have ended up,” said Polychoni Stergiou, the 64-year-old nurse’s mother-in-law. “That didn’t happen because of my son-in-law.”
Tachtatzoglou arranged an intensive unit in the ground floor apartment of his family’s two-story house in the village of Agios Athanasios, located about 30 kilometers (almost 20 miles) from the city. He rented, borrowed and modified monitors, oxygen delivery cars and other equipment that loved ones might need.
He improvised too. From a hat holder, he created an IV bag holder. At one point, the reused pole held four bags that dispensed antibiotics, fluids to treat dehydration, and fever-reducing medications.
“I have been working in the intensive care unit for 20 years and I did not want to put my in-laws through the psychological effort of separation. In addition, there has already been a lot of pressure on the health service, “Tachtatzoglou told the AP in an interview.
In most countries, doctors and nurses are discouraged from treating relatives and close friends based on the theory that emotional ties could disrupt their judgment and affect their skills. Tachtatzoglou says he remained in daily contact with doctors at Papageorgiou Hospital, the overcrowded unit where he works while caring for his sick family members, and that he would have hospitalized any of the four if their intubation was necessary. .
“I looked for them to the point where they would pose no danger,” he said. “At any moment, I was ready to move them to the hospital, if necessary.”
Greece, with a population of 10.7 million, has spent the first phase of the coronavirus pandemic with some of the lowest infection rates in Europe. With the onset of cold weather, the number of confirmed cases and deaths related to viruses began to double. The country’s cumulative pandemic balance went from 393 on October 1 and 635 a month later to 2,517 on December 1. As of Tuesday, it amounted to 4,730.
With ICU wards in Thessaloniki up to capacity, patients with COVID-19 considered too ill to wait for a bed were taken to hospitals in other parts of Greece, traveling in torpedo-shaped treatment capsules. Meanwhile, the situation for Tachtatzoglou’s family deteriorated as his wife and in-laws fell ill in alarming succession.
Tachtatzoglou said he was constantly agonizing over transferring his relatives to hospitals in Thessaloniki, knowing it would mean they could not see each other and could be moved to a more distant hospital.
“It simply came to our notice then. There were moments when I was desperate and I was really afraid that I would lose them “, said the nurse.
They all managed to get through, although Tachtatzoglou eventually became infected with himself.
“I took precautions when I treated them, but I didn’t have the personal protective equipment you find in hospitals,” he said. “That’s probably how I got sick.”
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