Argenis Rodriguez at work at the hospital.
Argenis Rodriguez remembers seeing his first Covid 19-positive patient in mid-March, an older man, hooked up to life support. Rodriguez did not think the man would survive his fight.
The man did survive —first transferred from ICU, and Rodriguez learned this week, now discharged from the hospital.
“It was a great feeling, a sense of pride for our team working hard to get him better, of kind of beating this pandemic,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez works on the seventh floor of the Yale New Haven Hospital as a patient care associate. Normally, he focuses on surgeries. Now, he hands nurses tubing for blood work and washcloths for cleaning Covid-positive patients through the door of the intensive care unit. He and the nurse communicate by writing on small whiteboards.
The nurses wear caps, gowns, gloves and N95 respirators. Seventh-floor PCAs like Rodriguez wear masks and gloves and try not to enter the rooms at all.
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YNHH Nurse Courtney Acker, engaged to be married to Rodriguez in August.
Rodriguez’s shift runs from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. He has the same shift as his fiancée Courtney Acker, who is a nurse in the sixth floor ICUs. Rodriguez and Acker hope to get married in August, if the pandemic subsides and rules on large gatherings have lifted by then.
“It’s very hard right now. We’re juggling long hours, not really being able to see our family and also trying to plan a wedding during this,” Rodriguez said.
The closest Rodriguez has come to seeing other family members is through the screen door of his mother’s porch. His mother has health conditions that would put her at higher risk of serious illness if she caught Covid-19.
“I stay away because I don’t want her to be in the predicament that I see others in in the hospital,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez’s family and friends were in his first thoughts when he saw how serious Covid-19 is for patients. He thought about how to warn them to isolate themselves from others and take the disease seriously.
He also saw how alone patients looked with their families barred from entering the hospital. The nurses were the ones holding patients’ hands. Recently, the hospital has provided iPads for patients so they can call their families and watch videos from them, Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez’s coworkers celebrate a donated meal this week.
Rodriguez has seen patients live and die during the Covid-19 pandemic. Every time patients fully recover and leave the hospital, YNHH plays the song “Rise Up.” Rodriguez claps along with his floor when that happens.
Dinner donations from restaurants and coworkers’ families, like this donation from Tata’s Rodriguez prompted, help too.
“It’s just been great to see how much the community has reached out to us. It’s really helped us continue doing what we’re doing,” Rodriguez said.
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