“If you aren’t in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” ― T.S. Eliot
The LA Times featured my hospital system, and specifically my hospital, Sharp Memorial, in a photo journal. It was surreal seeing the hallways and wards that I walk through on a daily basis pictures in such a vivid and prolific manner. The second photo is in an ER bay that I walk in almost every day I’m at work to admit patients.
In this strange time and place where every aspect of medicine has been affected by the virus, making clinical decisions for our patients has arguably never been harder. When I look back on this time of my career 20 years from now, I know we’ll be proud of our strength, our sacrifice, our courage… and our friends. The friends who helped us clean and doff our PAPRs in the ED, the friends who laughed and cried with us as we attended COVID-19 treatment update meetings on Zoom, the friends who had pizza delivered to the wards because they know that will be the only thing you have time to eat that day, the friends who held the hands of our dying patient in the ICU. As I witness each act of friendship, I’m learning just how enormous and significant kindness and love can be, and that makes me immeasurably proud to be even just a small part of your lives.