{"id":82911,"date":"2020-04-15T13:16:25","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T17:16:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/busm\/?p=82911"},"modified":"2020-04-15T13:45:23","modified_gmt":"2020-04-15T17:45:23","slug":"you-shouldnt-have-to-be-worrying-about-childcare-when-youre-fighting-a-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/camed\/2020\/04\/15\/you-shouldnt-have-to-be-worrying-about-childcare-when-youre-fighting-a-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cYou Shouldn\u2019t Have to Be Worrying about Childcare When You\u2019re Fighting a Pandemic\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Zoom shot of MED students who helped mobilize Medical Personnel Support, a network of health professional student volunteers to help front liners at BMC and BHCHP: Ravi Patel (top left) and Tyler Hanna; Melanie Fritz (center left) and S. G. Keller; Maria Narvaez (bottom left) and Madhura Paresh Shah; all but Fritz (MED\u201922) are first-year students.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The email went out to physicians, nurses, lab techs, case managers, custodial workers\u2014everyone working on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic at Boston Medical Center and Boston Healthcare for the Homeless: Do you need temporary childcare, grocery shopping, pharmacy pickup, pet sitting, help with laundry?<\/p>\n

It was an offer that was hard to refuse.<\/p>\n

When students at the Boston University School of Medicine, who could not be on those crisis front lines, wanted desperately to help, they realized where they could pitch in. They mobilized a team of medical and health professional student volunteers, with the goal of lightening the load for people who work at BMC and Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program (BHCHP), two places where COVID-19 was becoming a full-fledged crisis. They sent out an email asking if anyone at either place needed assistance with chores\u2014even the most mundane. And the responses came pouring in.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy 8-month-old daughter has an ear infection,\u201d a BMC pediatrician wrote in. \u201cI would like to be able to start the amoxicillin as soon as possible but can\u2019t get out to pharmacy with both my kids\u2014and my husband is working in the ER today.\u201d<\/p>\n

A BHCHP nurse-practitioner, worried that her daycare center would be closing, needed coverage. \u201c\u2026would accept help 1 or all days, any block of time,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

A BMC resident with a broken washing machine needed a place to do his laundry. \u201cCan do it myself if I can be helped with transit & have a place that isn\u2019t a public laundromat,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Tyler Hanna (MED\u201923), at home in Southington, Conn., watched closely by his dog, Theodore, matching volunteers with coronavirus crisis front liners at BMC and BHCHP who need help with childcare, grocery shopping, and other daily chores. Photo by Susan Hanna<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

To reach those who may not have access to computers, the students had flyers, in English and Spanish, posted in BMC employee lounges. Anyone who needed help was invited to text their requests to Medical Personnel Support<\/a> (MPS), the organization Tyler Hanna (MED\u201923) and classmates Ravi Patel (CAS\u201918, MED\u201923) and S. G. Keller (MED\u201923) started with a group of other MED students. Other than reimbursement for groceries and gas mileage, no payment was necessary or expected.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, it\u2019s all fueled by anxiety and frustration,\u201d says Hanna. \u201cWe have all felt very useless. At this point I only know a whole lot of physiology. I don\u2019t have a lot of clinical skills. As first-year students, this is what we can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Ravi Patel\u2019s rabbit, Luna, kept him company while he built the website for Medical Personnel Support, the network of health professional student volunteers mobilized by MED students to help COVID-19 front liners at BMC and BHCHP. Photo courtesy of Patel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

More than 320 volunteers\u2014most of them from MED, but also from the Schools of Dental Medicine and Public Health, as well as from other Boston-area schools\u2014have signed on with MPS. Medical students across the United States have mobilized similar efforts. Meanwhile, fourth-year MED students are graduating a month early<\/a> so they can join the frontline battle against COVID-19 as hospitals are facing staff shortages and an overwhelming crush of patients. As of April 14, Massachusetts had 28,163 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 957 deaths<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hanna and his classmates got guidance and the go-ahead from MED, BMC, and BHCHP, although MPS is not affiliated with any of those institutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey identified a need,\u201d says BMC emergency medicine physician Jeffrey Schneider<\/a>, a MED associate professor, who oversees graduate medical training at the hospital and is the student volunteers\u2019 liaison. \u201cAll we had to do was get out of their way.\u201d<\/p>\n

At MED, the students vetted their detailed plan with Angela Jackson<\/a>, associate dean of student affairs, who was also hearing from third- and fourth-year students eager to pitch in on the front lines. \u201cI read it, I said, \u2018Yes, this works, [but] I worry about that,\u2019\u201d she says. \u201cThey fixed it, sent it back, and they were good to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

The most urgent need of front liners<\/h3>\n

A month later, Hanna, who plans to specialize in pediatrics, is in his bedroom at home, in Southington, Conn., 120 miles from Boston, with his labrador retriever, Theodore, at his feet. When he isn\u2019t scrolling through the MPS database to match volunteers with healthcare providers, he\u2019s Zooming into four-hour lectures on gastrointestinal physiology, helping with an effort to make medical masks on a 3D printer in his town, or doing the grocery shopping for his mother, a middle school cafeteria worker.<\/p>\n

Patel and Keller are helping to lead MPS from Boston. Patel, who plans to be an emergency medicine physician, is also screening COVID-19 patients as a BHCHP volunteer. Keller and other members of the team are working with BHCHP and BMC to coordinate food delivery for vulnerable patients. Expanding their volunteer services as the need arises, the group has added tutoring, translating, medical face shield assembly, and personal protective equipment (PPE) collection and drop-off to the list.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Ravi Patel assembling face shields for healthcare workers from materials collected by Boston Healthcare for the Homeless, where Patel volunteers. Photos courtesy of Patel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But with daycare centers and schools closed because of the virus, and grandparents and other relatives who used to be relied on for babysitting now social-distancing at home, the most urgent need\u2014from physicians, nurses, case managers, and custodial workers\u2014is for emergency childcare. \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t have to be worrying about childcare when you\u2019re, like, fighting a pandemic,\u201d says Keller, who plans on becoming a trauma surgeon.<\/p>\n

Dan Kirshenbaum (CAS\u201907, MED\u201911), a BMC cardiology fellow who is covering extra shifts because of the coronavirus, turned to MPS after the Boston daycare center his two children, four years old and almost two, closed because of the pandemic. His wife, who is an attorney, is now working at home. They\u2019re paying full tuition to keep their daycare slots, says Kirshenbaum, adding that many healthcare workers are in the same position<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a matter of whether you can afford childcare,\u201d he says. \u201cNo one can find childcare.\u201d<\/p>\n

MPS\u2019s mission is \u201cto serve the people with the most need,\u201d says Keller, and those include physical therapists, front-desk staff, case managers, custodial workers, nurses, and residents. \u201cRight now everyone is essential,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Cardiologist Marcello Panagia<\/a>, a MED assistant professor, who has been rotating through extra shifts and covering calls at BMC because of the coronavirus, and his wife, Genny Sabin, needed help for their two daughters, ages five and eight, after their schools closed. Sabin, a director for a financial services firm, has been working full-time from their home in Newton.<\/p>\n

Hanna matched the family with Amanda Saxton and her roommate, Gianna Francis, both Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences physician assistant students (their final semester and graduation have been postponed). They live near Newton, they have a car, and they were self-quarantining.<\/p>\n

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Health professional student volunteers Amanda Saxton (left) and Gianna Francis (right) with eight-year-old Lydia and five-year-old Emilia, whose father, BMC cardiologist Marcello Panagia, asked for help with childcare after his daughters\u2019 schools closed and his wife began working full-time from home. Photos courtesy of Genny Sabin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As is expected of all the volunteers, and the healthcare providers asking for help, Saxton and Francis have pledged that if they had even the suspicion of a possible exposure to the virus, they would notify MPS immediately and stay home, or cancel.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore we knew it, Amanda and Gianna were here,\u201d Sabin says. \u201cMy daughters loved them from day one. They had such a positive attitude. They brought worksheets and did art and history projects with the girls. It was more than I could ever have wished for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sabin is near tears talking about the anchor the volunteers provided her family. \u201cIt alleviates an enormous amount of stress,\u201d she says. \u201cIn an environment where there could be layoffs, in a two-parent working family where one is a healthcare worker, if the other one can\u2019t do her job or his job, you start to get worried if you\u2019re not performing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The help from MPS is intended to be temporary, a bridge until medical providers and staff can make more permanent arrangements. But these days nothing feels permanent, or even long-term.<\/p>\n

Saxton and Francis alternated three-hour shifts, five days a week, for two weeks before they came to a decision: they\u2019re both from Florida, and they needed to drive home to check up on their parents.<\/p>\n

Francis and Saxton \u201chave had a lot of stress to deal with as well,\u201d says Sabin. \u201cIt\u2019s a testament to both of them that they were able to come into our home and be so joyful and loving.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would have left sooner if it wasn\u2019t for Genny and her family,\u201d says Saxton. \u201cWe told the girls we\u2019ll take them out for ice cream when we get back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Panagia put the family\u2019s name back in the pool, Sabin says, and her daughters are now smitten with their new MPS volunteer, Katelyn Trecartin (MED\u201923).<\/p>\n

\n

I don\u2019t have a lot of clinical skills. As first-year students, this is what we can do.<\/h3>\n

\u2014Tyler Hanna (MED\u201923)<\/h3>\n
\n

Benjamin Matthews is the BMC resident who was looking for a ride and access to a working washing machine. MPS volunteer Sarah Zambrano (MED\u201921) offered to drive to Roxbury to pick up Matthews\u2019 two loads of laundry. She put on gloves, did the wash at her apartment\u2014she has a machine that works\u2014while tuning in to her online classes, and then brought the clean laundry back to his apartment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like it was the least I could do to help someone whose daily reality is staring this pandemic right in the face and witnessing all the suffering,\u201d Zambrano says.<\/p>\n

Matthews was both grateful for, and impressed by, the help. He wrote in an email: \u201cThese students\u2019 willingness to do anything they can\u2014even a stranger\u2019s laundry\u2014to help support the frontline workers or make social distancing doable highlights the commitment they\u2019ll show for their patients in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Healthcare and support workers needing the services of the health professions students volunteering with Medical Personnel Support or health professions students interested in volunteering with Medical Personnel Support can find more info here<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

This BU Today<\/em> story was written by Sara Rimer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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