Painting a Pandemic
Pulmonary critical care physician finds solace through art during the Covid-19 pandemic In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, Justin Fiala, MD, was feeling whiplash. He split his time between quarantine at home and seven-day stretches in the medical intensive care unit (MICU) at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. As a pulmonary, critical care, and sleep […]
Ready for Another Pandemic Malady? It’s Called ‘Decision Fatigue’
Most all of us have felt the exhaustion of pandemic-era decision-making. Should I travel to see an elderly relative? Can I see my friends and, if so, is inside OK? Mask or no mask? Test or no test? What day? Which brand? Is it safe to send my child to day care? Questions that once […]
Restarting After Covid-19
Woodridge residents Bob and Gloria Pluta have spent the majority of their 44-year marriage scrunched into suburbia, surrounded by neighbors, cars, and noise. When the Covid-19 pandemic hit back in 2020, the constant closeness made them realize that something had to change. They had to find some physical and mental space. So they did. And […]
Op-Ed: Overwhelmed Hospitals Face a Covid Surge
These days, the majority of patients I see on my shifts in the emergency department are Covid-19 patients. In the ER, these patients range from people with mild fevers and slight Covid cough to people who are struggling to breathe, some of whom we put into a medically induced coma, intubate, and place on a […]
Coping with the Coronavirus Pandemic for People with Anxiety Disorders
These days, we all have to accept the anxiety inherent in living in the time of the coronavirus pandemic and Covid-19. If there were a way to dispel all anxious feelings, I’d tell you, but there isn’t. The one exception might be someone who could summon such a degree of denial that they carry on […]
Revoking My Corona Pass
Accepting the challenge of the new ‘normal’ What’s the state of your mental health these days? Are you anxious? Depressed? Scared? Angry? Frustrated? Lonely? Or an ever-changing mix of all of the above? Yeah. Me, too. Since mid-March when the coronavirus morphed from a nearly forgettable news headline to an omnipresent malignancy that potentially lurked […]
Covid-19’s Toll on Mental Health
The coronavirus pandemic, with all of its stressors, has triggered anxiety, depression, and other disorders When Covid-19 caused businesses to send employees home to work remotely, Ashima Bhayana was relieved. The 32-year-old customer success specialist at a Chicago health tech company had struggled at times to “be around colleagues, to put on a brave face” […]
Vulnerable Adults
These 4 risk factors make older people more prone to Covid-19 complications Shortly after a visit to New York in April, John Troy was diagnosed with Covid-19. Troy, 71, of Skokie, was hospitalized for 12 days due to the illness. “Before they even got the results from my Covid-19 test, they hospitalized me,” he says. […]
Eliminating the Pandemic of Racism
I love storms, even when they are frightening. When I look at the timing of COVID-19 and what has erupted from the brutal killing of George Floyd, I see not only a storm but a perfect storm — an opportunity for deep examination, for the realization of relationship, for the letting go of what’s been and what’s […]
‘It’s Not Over Until It’s Over’
5 things to know about hitting the COVID-19 peak As New York, California and other states begin to see their numbers of new COVID-19 cases level off or even slip, it might appear as if we’re nearing the end of the pandemic. President Donald Trump and some governors have pointed to the slowdown as an […]
Facing a Surge, Chicago-Area Hospitals Are Fighting for Coronavirus Tests
Photos courtesy of Rush University Medical Center With a fever, a cough and trouble breathing, Chicago resident Deborah Lielasus, who lives in North Center, was worried that she had COVID-19. Because she is 60 years old and immunocompromised due to autoimmune myelitis — both coronavirus risk factors — she was extra-concerned. She feared that her […]
