Do you want to know what happens to you on a ventilator?

[leftieNanner]

Warning. This is grim. Front page article of our local paper yesterday.

https://www.mailtribune.com/top-stories/2021/08/20/icu-nurses-describe-battle-against-covid-19/

We all hear about people being put on ventilators when they can't breathe. I had no idea how horrible it is and what it does to a person's body.

I'm in Southern Oregon and our county is being slammed by Covid cases. Only 46% vaccinated so far. Hopefully if enough people read this article, they might consider getting the shots.

[COL Mustard]

1. And Yet People Don't Want To Wear A Mask Because It's Uncomfortable. Idiots.

[cate94]

2. It's a horrible way to die.

I have told my power of attorney healthcare, never put me on a ventilator. Most people who go on a ventilator end up dead anyway.

[Treefrog]

3. It's awful, and I can't read that article right now.

But thanks for posting it.

My father was on one following heart surgery. He came out of the sedation early and believed he was suffocating. We were rushed out of the room, but his face at that point I’ll never forget. Pure terror.

I think I’d say no to it were I ever in that situation.

[roamer65]

6. I know the feeling he had.

Before my CPAP, I would reflux into my windpipe. It would spasm and completely close off for about 30-45 seconds.

I would bolt upright in bed in pure terror.

[Bayard]

4. I think of articles like this

Every time my brother and his wife refuse to get vaccinated. We have begged, cajoled, and threatened, as has their daughter with the infant daughter she has not allowed them to see since born.

It breaks my heart. We were a family of 5 kids. He and I are all that's left.

[Tink41]

5. My Mother

They pulled her out of induced coma after about 3.5 weeks. She had previously requested no heroic efforts ( can't remember directives wording) my Father was convinced she wanted to fight. God have mercy. To hear what she went thru like that, breaks my heart 14 yrs later. Unimaginable. She was gone less than 2 weeks later.

[jmbar2]

7. This is the most graphic and gruesome description of the horrors of Covid I've seen yet.

Thanks for posting. Should be on every newscast for the next month.

I'm staying hunkered down, away from people willing to risk this horrible fate.

[KS Toronado]

11. Yep, should be on every evening news broadcast.

[Rebl2]

16. And every

newspaper

[erronis]

24. Agree.

[leftieNanner]

25. I sent it to Rachel

She is talking about the Covid slamming the American south, but the Oregon south is in bad shape too.

[AllaN01Bear]

8. many ppl have no recollection of what these are .

https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/medicine/iron-lung#is-it-still-used-today

[LymphocyteLover]

9. my poor premature son was on a ventilator for the first couple months of his life

saved his life but did cause some long-term problems with his throat

[llashram]

10. wow

how very very grim...

[JoeOtterbein]

12. This made me cry:

Eckroth, 42, said he’s seen people younger than himself die.

“It’s awful. When you see a guy’s 10-year-old son wail on his dad’s body for two hours, it just ages you. I’ve got two kids. There’s just about nothing worse,” he said.

[jmbar2]

13. Could the monoclonal antibody treatment have prevented this?

I suppose if you are antivax, you wouldn't be predisposed to monoclonal antibody treatment either.

But I wonder how many of these folks it could keep off the vents.

[leftieNanner]

26. It can - if you get the treatment before you get very sick

The article mentions several patients who deny that they have Covid - just as they are about to be ventilated. They would have needed to go to the doctor as soon as they had symptoms or tested positive. Once you are in the ICU, it's too late for that to help. That's my understanding of it anyway.

[TNNurse]

14. I once took care of a man who had treatable pneumonia but his family

refused the ventilator because he would never forgive them for restraining his hands. His oxygen level was too low to make decisions himself. The doctors tried to convince them it was just a treatable pneumonia...but they were adamant. We did not intubate him and he indeed died in the ICU.

Hands are restrained because if you wake up and feel a tube in your throat, you are going to try to pull it out. Someone might not be in time to get it back in.

[Tadpole Raisin]

35. I wish there was a way to safely and legally let an anti vaxxer experience what it

Felt like not to be able to breathe. I wonder how many would then change their mind.

I have gotten so frustrated that sometimes I don’t care - let them suffer! And that angers me even more because I feel like they are stripping away my empathy and humanity even as I know that only I can allow that to happen and I have to work through that.

I really appreciate your experience and insight.

[Auggie]

15. I'd like to see a series of :30 videos ...

air during Sunday Night football commercial breaks. Show everything—the bloating, the purple skin, the catheters, the dying.

Puke up your chicken wings and beer? I don't care.

[wryter2000]

17. I was on a ventilator for ARDS in 1988 for over a week

I was on my back, though. I was 39 at the time.

I was heavily sedated. I did have the other tubes coming in and out of my body, and I hallucinated for much of the time, at least early on. I was told that's common in ICU. But none of the rest of this happened to me.

I was able to watch TV and use a pen and paper to communicate with people. My husband visited, and he was allowed to feed me ice chips. For some reason, I thought I needed them. It was difficult but there was no pain.

Eventually, I was able to breathe on my own and was given an oxygen mask.

I have a feeling a lot of this is specific to COVID, and people should be warned about it. But if someone you know needs a ventilator for something else, please ask your doctor how much of this will happen before you freak. It saved my life, and I recovered fully.

[leftieNanner]

28. Absolutely right

The Covid patients who need to be ventilated are a special breed, I think.

I'm so glad you recovered.

[LeftInTX]

44. Cardinal Burke was on the vent was removed from the vent after five days

A local celebrity was on a vent for covid for about a week, and now he went home.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/21/cardinal-raymond-burke-vaccine-skeptic-ventilator-covid-19
https://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local/article/Cleto-Rodriguez-COVID-ICU-San-Antonio-16380295.php

Not everyone who needs a ventilator for Covid dies......

I knew one of the early cases from last year. He worked at a funeral home. He was on a ventilator for a month and he is 70 and overweight...He survived....I honestly thought he was going to die.
He still has a few effects from Covid, but he is in remarkably good health.

[leftieNanner]

49. That's good news

I was interested and horrified to read about the potential effects of a bad case of Covid.

I just found out that my county has the worst vaccination rate in the state of Oregon. We are back to isolating other than grocery runs. Never stopped masking and we are going to ask about the booster.

[LeftInTX]

50. I think what they wrote was probably more applicable at the beginning of the pandemic

I know it's recently dated...

At first, ventilators were the only treatment....And a ventilator isn't going to stop your body's systemic effects of Covid.

Now there are more treatments such as regeneron etc.
Being on a ventilator has gotta suck big time, but they work best short-term.
For premature infants, they now usually stay on for like 24 hours instead of weeks. (This is due to many new meds that have been introduced in the last 30 years)

BTW there are people who actually live on ventilators. 99% of them have paralysis from the neck down, usually from a fracture and cannot breathe on their own.

[leftieNanner]

51. The article I posted at the beginning

was about the situation right now in one of our local hospitals.

When the Covid infection gets so bad that the ventilator is needed, I guess the effects on the whole body are beyond belief.

Many people have posted about being ventilated in the past and surviving. My guess is that the circulatory impact with Covid (blood clots) may have something to do with it.

[PatrickforB]

18. Well, I would rather die than be on a ventilator.

Sorry, but there are some things worse than death, and that is definitely one of them.

That said, both my wife and I are fully vaccinated, and looking forward to our booster shots. We also mask.

[wryter2000]

37. I had that choice

I chose life. I've had 33 years of a good life since that illness and my time on the ventilator.

[PatrickforB]

45. Yeah, I hear you, but I'm in my sixties, and have a number of health issues,

including lung and heart issues, so if I am condemned to a ventilator, it will be a living hell until I die.

Like I said...

[samplegirl]

19. I was on a vent for 3 months

in 1978 I was just 20 years old. Stricken with Guillain Barre Syndrome.
It was the worst thing I ever experienced and Covid left me without a doubt full of fear anywhere in public.

[rurallib]

20. Someone posted this video here about a week ago - it is from Australia

not quite as graphic as your story, but ire caught my attention:

[Owl]

21. Horrible!

[Grasswire2]

22. I worked in an ICU within hearing and seeing of patients on ventilators.

And I learned very quickly that there is something worse than death.

If you have ever heard the sound of a patient being suctioned by the nurse, you would do almost anything to avoid being that patient.

I don't know what proportion of those patients were able to survive, be extubated, and thrive. I do know that I helped move gurneys of patients to the morgue, through the hospital hallway and elevator.

[Grasswire2]

23. I was the unit clerk, which in those days (prior to computerized charting)...

meant transcribing doctors written orders for the nurses, ordering tests and procedures, keeping charts, calling codes at instruction of doctors/nurses to summon the daily team that would do resuscitation, and a zillion other tasks. Knowledge of medical terminology and ability to maintain poise amidst hell breaking loose were critical. The things I heard, and saw, marked me although it was all in a day's work.

Nurses are saints walking among us.

[wryter2000]

39. You got that

Especially ICU nurses. I can't imagine being a pediatric ICU nurse.

Doctors are wonderful, but it was the nurses who saved my life.

[erronis]

27. This article really frightens me about the future of nursing in general.

They are so under-appreciated both by the patients and by many doctors. And yet they are the best people to have caring for you at bedside.

When a patient thinks s/he knows better than the medical professionals, I'd like them to walk out the front door and find some charlatan who purveys magic cures (like Mercola, tfg, Lindel, etc.) But don't come back to the hospital.

[durablend]

29. Clearly NOTHING gets through to some of them

Some patients and family members insist the problem is pneumonia or some other condition, not COVID-19.

“We’ve had patients deny it to their death. They say, ‘It’s not COVID. It’s something else.’ We’re tired of arguing with them, so we say, ‘Fine, it’s pneumonia.’ But it’s pneumonia caused by COVID,” McEwan said.

Like everything else, they simply CAN'T admit they're wrong, instead they'd rather die.

[redstatebluegirl]

30. I watched my mom spend her last few weeks on this earth

on a ventilator, it was horrible. I tell people the graphic details when MAGA nuts will not get the shot. I would not wish that on my worst enemy.

[JCMach1]

31. I got within a whisker last September. It's not pneumonia

You may have had experience with. I could literally feel parts of my lungs dying/dissolving.

Funny how the media doesn't publish experiences like what happened to me during and after.

[Elessar Zappa]

48. Glad you were able to recover.

Do you have any chronic effects from it?

[Tadpole Raisin]

32. I had the wind knocked out of me when I slipped on a trampoline in gym class eons ago

and I remember lying on my back on the trampoline trying to breathe as my gym teacher freaked out.

It only lasted a few seconds. I was pretty active as a youth so I had lots of cuts and bruises. I hardly remember any of them but I remember that!!!

I learned never tell someone (e.g., with COPD) that you know how they feel breathing. You don’t. I do but only for a fraction of a minute. I would never want that for anybody.

That is one of the most scary things and the look doctors see in these peoples eyes before they will be put on a ventilator is real.

How can anyone be so obstinate to dismiss that…

[Skittles]

40. when I first came to Texas I ate a jalapeno in a restaurant

I'd never had one before and it freaked me out, I felt like I couldn't breathe - there was an off-duty fireman at a nearby table who came over and pounded on my back a couple of times - that got me breathing, and he had a server bring me some milk to cool down my mouth and throat.....I will NEVER forget what it was like just for those few moments feeling like I could not get a breath....it astounds me that anyone would gamble with their health the way the anti-vaxxers do

[Fritz Walter]

33. This article should be required-reading for legislators

Not to mention a handful of governors.

Or better still show them the graphic photos and videos, including audio of the mourning son of the dead patient.

OK, getting Boebert, Greene, Gaetz, Jordan et al. to put their phones down for five minutes is asking WAY too much of them. But if it could convince one legislator to consider the consequences their anti-vax and anti-mask rhetoric and start making better decisions, it's be worth it!

[calimary]

34. Bookmarking this - someday I may be brave enough to read it.

Both my husband and I are being almost ferociously cautious. Always with the masks. Always with the social distancing. Always ordering drive-up take-out. Always staying in and only socializing on the phone, FaceTime, and all meetings are Zooms.

Haven’t met our new grandchild who was born in late January. Haven’t seen her big sister in person in a couple of years. So be it. I’d much rather be safe than sorry.

And btw, if possible, order a lanyard or two (they’re cheap!) and you can wear your mask tethered around your neck, like a necklace, all day, and it’s right there where and when you need it, no matter where you are or what you’re doing.

Nothing to drop on the floor and get dirty. Nothing to fall out of your pocket when you didn’t notice. Nothing to have to keep track of and try to remember where you put it or where you last set it down!

And if you enjoy personal adornment, hey, why not indulge in a decorative mask? I have a couple all rhinestone-studded, a couple of sequin-covered, some of pretty printed fabric, a few with slogans, one with a drawing of Cousin It, even one with Beatles (masked, themselves), fun ones! If we have to wear masks, shit! WHY THE HELL NOT have fun with them? For me, they’ve become more than life-saving necessities. By now, they’re fashion accessories! And sometimes you might even get a comment or two from someone who sees your mask and gets a kick out of it!

Why not? You never know! Maybe somebody who wasn’t gonna bother with a mask might just change their minds if they realized they could have one with the Beatles on it!

[calimary]

36. Btw, watching the grim COVID news this morning,

I notice the sound bites of nurses lamenting what they have to deal with - as patients in ICU continue downhill and having to be put on ventilators. They wear caps with patterns and prints with flowers or little cartoon animals and I understand why. A desperate attempt to give a patient a little smile or something cheery to look at, or to distract them visually even if only for a moment or two. To take even just a teensy bit of fear and dread downward. They’re doing a service for patient morale, just by wearing something like that.

[calimary]

38. And the thought just occurred to me...

Hey! Christmas is coming. Highly doubtful COVID will be conquered by then. Why not consider some fun masks as gifts? Christmassy ones might actually get worn during the holidays and help cheer somebody up!

Lots of fun ones available online, and in my experience they’re inexpensive, easy to order, with no muss/no fuss delivery in just a few days!

[Texaswitchy]

41. My housemate is a retired RN.

She told me about this.

I do not mind staying home.

[Calculating]

42. I would sooner die

Honestly there are worse things than dying, and ending up on a ventilator sounds like one of them. Don't like 90% of the people on them die anyway? Might as well die with some diginity.

[KentuckyWoman]

43. I've been on a vent and didn't experience most of this.

Some of this might be specific to covid.

I had been treated repeatedly over several years for recurring pneumonia, which turned out not to be pneumonia. Congestive Heart failure. Once they got enough of the fluid out of my lungs they vented me for about 10 days. It was not fun for anyone. I don't remember much but what I have is traumatic.

But it did save my life without any major lasting physical damage. Wearing a mask for covid is a mental game because of it. Plus I also have asthma now that I am older, which doesn't help.

I tell people, if I can wear a mask, anyone can.

[Raine]

46. My father was on one 12yrs ago before died

I had no idea how horrible that thing was until he was on it. I regret to this day that I gave permission for them to hook him up to it. I would never do that again or want it for myself.

[scrabblequeen40]

47. More people should read this

Horrifying experience. I know owning the libs is a priority, but damn. At some point, death is a gift.