# A great article on the experience of a Covid patient in  intensive care



## Brendan Burgess (25 Jan 2021)

Covid and me: 10 days on life support  | Free to read
					

After a month in hospital, FT critic Tim Hayward reflects on his battle with coronavirus




					www.ft.com
				




By the Financial Times critic Tim Hayward



_I am wheeled into a side room with four medics. One introduces himself as an anaesthetist; another, directly and with no hedging, tells me they’re “worried I’ll pull out the tubes” — they need to put me to sleep. There’s no debate . . . I guess that’s the point. But, like every other news junkie and doom scroller in the country, I know what this means. People who go into intensive care, who get anaesthetised and held on life support, don’t tend to have what the news euphemises as “good outcomes”. I’m hit with awful clarity that this is probably the most significant moment in my whole life. “It will just feel like going to sleep,” says the medic. True . . . but I have no idea whether I’ll wake up. _

...


On December 15, I’m discharged with a big bag of p ills and an assurance that community teams will be in touch to support my recovery. I was in Addenbrooke’s for 30 days. For about half that time, I was on oxygen; for 10 days, I was fully unconscious and on life support. For 30 days, I didn’t use most of my muscles and spent only minutes out of bed. I lost just over 14kg in weight, around two stone. I’d like to say it was all fat but, sadly, a lot of it is muscle. My legs look like two bits of grey wool, my stomach is pleasingly flat, but so is my chest. I get exhausted after about 10 minutes of anything. My voice has lost its resonance and I’m cold all the time — no muscles working to generate heat, no fat to insulate. All of this, they tell me, is likely to come back with the physiotherapy. The “clot-busters” should get rid of my embolism, though I’ll have to take drugs for it daily, and take precautions to avoid any bleeding. If I nick myself with a kitchen knife, it may well need a tourniquet not a blue plaster.


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## Ceist Beag (25 Jan 2021)

Thanks for posting Brendan. It's pretty scary reading. I don't know which bit is the most fearful but the description of intensive care, especially the line probably nails it for me.
"It’s hard to imagine a more invasive assault on the body than paralysing it and taking over all its functions. "


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## Purple (28 Jan 2021)

We do need to keep a sense of perspective here. around 220 people under the age of 65 have died of Covid19 in this country and more than 90% of those had a preexisting condition. In the under 45 age group the total deaths is around 20.


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## odyssey06 (28 Jan 2021)

Purple said:


> We do need to keep a sense of perspective here. around 220 people under the age of 65 have died of Covid19 in this country and more than 90% of those had a preexisting condition. In the under 45 age group the total deaths is around 20.



Under 65s account for 40% - 60% of ICU admissions.  The % of deaths is lower because they can pull through - with hospital and ICU treatment.


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## Purple (28 Jan 2021)

odyssey06 said:


> Under 65s account for 40% - 60% of ICU admissions.  The % of deaths is lower because they can pull through - with hospital and ICU treatment.


I understand that but there seems to be an element of fear mongering in much of the media. While there is a need to emphasis the seriousness of the illness and the absolute necessity to follow government guidelines I don't think it serves as a public good to further worry already frightened people who feel isolated and alone.
My mother is in her 70's and in a very high risk group and frightened. The last thing she needs to see is an article like this.


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## demoivre (28 Jan 2021)

Purple said:


> We do need to keep a sense of perspective here. around 220 people under the age of 65 have died of Covid19 in this country and more than 90% of those had a preexisting condition. In the under 45 age group the total deaths is around 20.



Perspective disappeared a long time ago . Of the confirmed Covid deaths so far 107 had no underlying conditions.


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## odyssey06 (28 Jan 2021)

Purple said:


> I understand that but there seems to be an element of fear mongering in much of the media. While there is a need to emphasis the seriousness of the illness and the absolute necessity to follow government guidelines I don't think it serves as a public good to further worry already frightened people who feel isolated and alone.
> My mother is in her 70's and in a very high risk group and frightened. The last thing she needs to see is an article like this.



Not saying there isn't fear mongering and chasing of clickbait headlines by the media but in this instance...

People are already frightened, I'm not clear why someone already concerned about the virus would be so 'triggered' by this particular report, any more than they would be by the daily death toll.
This is not a fabricated story, this actually happened. This is what the stakes are.
If we get more people following the guidelines because they have a healthy dose of fear about this virus, then we maybe get our of this mess sooner.

Considering just the risk of death e.g. if you are 55-64 is only part of the equation. You have a low risk of dying from this disease - because there is capacity to treat you. And our capacity is limited.


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## odyssey06 (28 Jan 2021)

demoivre said:


> Perspective disappeared a long time ago . Of the confirmed Covid deaths so far 107 had no underlying conditions.
> 
> View attachment 5282



A fuller perspective would be what % of Irish people have an underlying conditions, it is a significant proportion of Irish adults.
And again, deaths are only part of the equation - need to look at ICU admissions and hospitalisations.


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## demoivre (28 Jan 2021)

odyssey06 said:


> A fuller perspective would be what % of Irish people have an underlying conditions, it is a significant proportion of Irish adults.
> And again, deaths are only part of the equation - need to look at ICU admissions and hospitalisations.



I read recently that 32% of Irish adults have an underlying condition.

What would be useful to know about hospital and ICU admissions is how many of the people in there would be there anyway at this time of the year.


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## Purple (28 Jan 2021)

odyssey06 said:


> People are already frightened, I'm not clear why someone already concerned about the virus would be so 'triggered' by this particular report, any more than they would be by the daily death toll.


Human nature; people empathise when they see a human face put on the disease. 
Nobody cared about kids dying in Ethiopia until Michael Buerk broadcast from there with his eloquent description of what he called a Biblical Famine. 
This is the same. People read reports and think "that could be me" without factoring in the likelihood of it actually being them.


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