DUTY...that never was....

I spoke to a friend DR TS a Psychiatrist. Sometime last month, he received an email asking him to join for COVID Duty. He got ready with the idea of contributing to the fight. But he got stumped when he discovered he had been assigned ICU management.

Now Psychiatrists are medical doctors, but after internship we did not get any much practice in medical interventions. We can do a good general and neurological examination and give intramuscular and intravenous injection if the occasion so demands- but beyond that we rely on our better equipped colleagues. In today’s world ICU management is beyond just TPRBP (Temp, pulse, respiration and blood pressure monitoring) which was the key thing when we did our training in general medicine. Of course, we have the general idea and having practiced rigorously in internship- a few weeks of good training may improve us. But I humbly admit that we cannot handle ICU for COVID patients.

So DR TS wrote back to the administration explaining the situation. He offered to work in screening out patient departments and in quarantine centres- where Psychiatrists can really do a good job. That was a month ago and no body’s replied to his email yet.

I felt DR TS was somewhat disappointed that he came so close to doing COVID duty and still missed the chance.  Its true, when so many people are calling helplines and all they need is reassurance- Psychiatrists can definitely play a role. A number of suicides have been reported in COVID wards- the mental health problems must be a lot. 

I think, the administration is so overwhelmed and also ignorant about medical issues- these things are getting missed. Meanwhile DR TS is recounting his experience of the duty that never was….