# A message from a medical professional...



## GeoRon (Jun 24, 2015)

kfalls said:


> P.P.S. Do a you tube search on intubation. Looks like hell, doesn't it?


Thank you kfalls for mentioning the "human" element at this time. All of these graphics of curves and bars should have a fill pattern of arms, legs and heads sticking out of a pile that truly defines the end product of a pandemic.

I did as recommended and went to youtube "intubation". As you know, even more horrible is failed intubation, that is, pulling the plugs and tubes and the "hell" one experiences during end of life.

We in Colorado and Oregon have protocols that will assist the suffering at end of life. Do you know if such options exist at this time in such cases other than just upping the morphine in the drip? 

Thank you again and sorry for such a sad question,

And I especially thank you and your family for your service.


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## 2tomcat2 (May 27, 2012)

kfalls,

Thank you

And certainly now, not us vs. them; not me, me, me

Strongly second, "please stay home" 

You and your family are patriots, first class

Again, thank you


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## zaczac4fun (Mar 21, 2018)

kfalls, 



All the support in the world for your message. I want to go rafting as much as anyone here, but not at that cost. 




You've all seen the number of potential fatalities, so I'm going to take a more personal approach.

As an EMT working just north of Denver, I'm going to echo kfalls plea, please stay home. While the elderly population is most at risk here, younger populations are not invincible to the effects of this virus and I am now regularly hearing stories from other care providers about healthy people in their 30s dying or on ventilators in the ICU. While it's a small chance, this is not how I want to die, and worse is the thought that I could bring this home to my family. 


This too will eventually pass, we'll all be on the river's again soon enough.
In the meantime, please stay home.


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## 50119 (Jan 17, 2016)

Thank you for your perspective and sacrifice Ben. 

There are hardships and sacrifices by many including my children with at home young children that live in my city. I would like nothing better than to have their families isolate per Washington State’s “strong request”, however they are required to go to work due to deemed essential functions (food, medical & adult care) for WA State. At this time, I would rather see them take a financial “hit” from being unemployed than be employed, which I have the ability to financially assist. 

Money is no object.

Parting statement: I have a niece (38 years old) that is an OB Resident in Delaware and her husband is an E.R. doctor in Maryland. Her father is an estate planning attorney 10 miles from the epicenter of Washington’s outbreak. Her mom received a call earlier this week from Emily asking dad to work on a trust/will for her and her husband.

My sister is devastated emotionally.


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## Ever_Cat (Jan 20, 2009)

This could be posted in any number of the current threads and this one is as good as any.

This is a link to an article about SAR during the pandemic. Kudos to all of the First Responders out there doing all that they can to help people in need while putting themselves at risk.

See below.
https://www.outsideonline.com/2411094/backcountry-accidents-coronavirus-colorado


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## trevko (Jul 7, 2008)

Thanks for posting and thanks to all the pre-hospital & hospital care folks out there. 

For a little levity while getting the message across...
stay the fuck home song- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0G63uzhFP4


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## griz (Sep 19, 2005)

That’s a very catchy tune. I bet it goes viral.


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## 2tomcat2 (May 27, 2012)

“Until that day I didn’t realize how many different ways the result of our actions could put people at risk in regard to the virus.” 

How best to have this message repeated everywhere, to everybody, every time folks look at their phones, across TV screens, etc.??


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## ColoradoDave (Jun 3, 2010)

A solvable vector of virus spread exists in supermarkets.


I, for one, consider going to the grocery store as essential and I will continue to do so unafraid. I practice distancing, not touching body orifices, and hand washing once home. I figure if I get it by environmental reasons, it will be a smaller dose and more easily managed. Rather than swapping spit with an infected person, no matter who it is and what the political or social conditions are.



But in the grocery store, the vegetables are just laying out there with those thin plastic bags around them. Anyone been successful in getting one of those bags open without licking your finger ? A possible land mine for someone that just cuts up a discarded specimen and eats it.



I'm not one to just poke at problems and not offer a solution, so I thought that maybe Grocers here could follow Europe's age-old practices of having a produce vendor give you the produce you want directly. No pawing through to find the best one. They know the produce, they give the next person the best one at the time. At least during the crisis then see if it works going forward later.


How to communicate that, though, is the crux.


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## 50119 (Jan 17, 2016)

ColoradoDave said:


> A solvable vector of virus spread exists in supermarkets.
> 
> ........................................
> 
> ...


I have been successful with bag opening. I wore my nitrile gloves last trip during the "old folk's hour" and without ANY effort opened up thos S.O.B.'s. There is enough stickiness to grip them. Does anybody else do that? Slim chance. Many other benefits also with gloves like splashing a bit of my home brew Everclear hand sanitizer on them every now and then when necessity shopping - they have no nook's, crannies or fingernails.

Hope it helps.


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## 50119 (Jan 17, 2016)

griz said:


> That’s a very catchy tune. I bet it goes viral.


For better or worse, that might be the pun of the century.


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## jamesthomas (Sep 12, 2010)

To me the most dangerous places are the gas station and the grocery store. I sanitize before I touch the pump so I don’t spread anything I might have and again before I get back into the truck. With groceries I spray the tailgate with bleach solution spread out the items and spray them off and reload into the bags. By the time I am home they are dry and virus free I hope. A quick rinse and put stuff away. I would probably not be as anal if my 84 year old mother in law wasn’t living with us. Stay safe out there buzzards.


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## jerseyjeff (Apr 16, 2016)

Kfalls

Well done. I am a teacher and my wife works in a hospital. I did a big food shop on 3/13 and we have been sheltering in place with the kids since then. My kids are a rowdy outdoor sort, and now before mountain biking, hiking and tree climbing, I ask them to be a bit more conservative, because I do not want to go to the ER. My oldest is a senior, and he is watching his senior year evaporate, no prom or graduation, and that is a bummer, but a small one. 
I have been talking with my colleagues, and have a backup plan to deliver instruction for if I become incapacitated, to make sure there is some sort of normalcy for our students. 
My wife comes home from the hospital wrecked, and we have an area for her to strip off clothes, then to the shower, and then finally dinner. Last sunday night we had a really hard conversation about how we would quarantine, and how we would manage COVID when it finally gets to our house, and how she does not want to kill me with COVID. (I am the oldest but still our of the high risk group) I feel like we are in an ever shrinking circle, and each night that my wife comes home from work, we re-start a 14 day clock to see if we are symptom free. 
We beat the spanish flu after huge loss with soap, water and social distancing, and we could do that here too, but too often folks thinks that they have something essential to do, and it puts us all at risk.
The CDC called for no gatherings of over 200 in early march, and we had 800+ kids in my school for a week and half longer. 
The next pandemic stuff is going to get shut down hard, earlier, but, we still need to get through this one.

Be well, and I hope it does not get to you.


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## 50119 (Jan 17, 2016)

*Stay the Hell at Home.*

I Rick S. (the_ anonomous coward_) just received this from a doctor that was with us on last June's MF trip.

_"We are 11 days into self-isolation and it is really upsetting me to witness my wife standing at the living room window gazing aimlessly into space with tears running down her cheeks. It breaks my heart to see her like this. I have thought very hard about how I can cheer her up. I have even considered letting her in - but rules are rules"._
Rick H.


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## ajmtn (Mar 17, 2015)

For anyone considering outdoor endeavors, I'd highly recommend reading this and consider the message (it's short): Local, Low-Risk Recreation - CalTopo
and also consider the impacts if you were to need a rescue: https://www.outsideonline.com/2411094/backcountry-accidents-coronavirus-colorado


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## BigSky (Apr 2, 2015)

ColoradoDave said:


> A solvable vector of virus spread exists in supermarkets.
> 
> 
> I, for one, consider going to the grocery store as essential and I will continue to do so unafraid. I practice distancing, not touching body orifices, and hand washing once home. *I figure if I get it by environmental reasons, it will be a smaller dose and more easily managed.* Rather than swapping spit with an infected person, no matter who it is and what the political or social conditions are.
> ...


Huh?? If you get it you get it. It literally makes no difference how you contract it. Stay in school, kids...


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## td (Apr 7, 2005)

I've read some articles that suggest the reason young, healthy doctors and nurses have died at a higher rate (especially in China before they knew enough about the sickness to take the right protective actions) is because they're exposed to the virus in larger doses and the virus is able to take a stronger foothold in their bodies before their immune system can catch up. Smaller initial exposures take longer to become a strong infection, which gives the immune system more time to recognize the threat and ramp up to win the battle. I'm not a doctor and don't know the validity of the articles, but there definitely is a line of thinking in the medical world that level of exposure is a factor in severity of infection. This is another reason that PPE is absolutely critical for our health care workers.


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## ColoradoDave (Jun 3, 2010)

BigSky said:


> Huh?? If you get it you get it. It literally makes no difference how you contract it. Stay in school, kids...



It is early days, but *if* the initial amount of virus a person is infected by doesn’t correlate with the severity of disease symptoms, this would mark covid-19 out as different from influenza, MERS and SARS.


For influenza, a higher amount of virus at infection has been associated with worse symptoms. It has been tested by exposing volunteers to escalating doses of influenza virus in a controlled setting and carefully monitoring them over several weeks. This hasn’t been done with covid-19, and is unlikely to happen, given its severity.


Controlled test data for H1N1 here : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25416753


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