Of determination and fortitude

Anesthesiologist Divya Poi has had to put her wedding on hold as she continues to work relentlessly at Deenanath Mangeshkar Hospital, Pune, while living away from her family in Goa

Danuska Da Gama | NT BUZZ

She leads a risky life, but one that’s filled with pride and of duty towards humanity and her nation. As an anesthesiologist, Divya Poi’s work usually involved administering anesthesia to patients in the operation theatre, keeping their heart beating and lungs filled with oxygen during surgery and making sure they wake up safely and without any pain after the surgery.

But since the pandemic began, Poi is now posted in the COVID ICU on a nine-hour shift. With two morning, three evening and two night shifts, followed by a three day off, Poi tells us that there’s a lot of protocol that’s
followed.

“We go in at the start of our shift, don the PPE and go about treating patients in the ICU without breaks because if you leave the ICU for no reason, you have to get rid of the PPE and that kit can’t be reused,” she explains. Thus to avoid unnecessary wastage of kits and avoid shortage, the team works without breaks. “This is our little way of showing concern and care towards our fellow members of the medical fraternity in other parts of the country,” she says.

And given the risk involved, Poi took the tough call of sending her parents back to Goa. “It was a conscious decision to send them back to Goa before the lockdown. My parents Vaicunth and Varsha are around 60 years old. They are diabetic and have high blood pressure issues. I did not want to expose them to the virus through me as I knew I would be coming in close contact with COVID positive patients every day,” she says.

And while Poi is used to living by herself, having moved out of the state to study and later work, about a decade ago, she admits that the lockdown days were tough. “As the house help was banned, along with carrying out my hospital duties, I had to do the household chores like cleaning and laundry which was well taken care of these years,” she says. Procuring groceries and everyday essentials was another difficult task because the shops were open only in the mornings and Poi used to get done with work only by late evening.

And she admits that working during these uncertain times while being away from the family has been a stressful experience for her.

“It was difficult to accept that now I had to stay away from my family not by choice but by compulsion. Also looking at the severity of the patients in the hospital, I kept stressing on the health of my family,” she says. Moreover not being around friends or family, while dealing with extremely sick patients whose prognosis is poor, takes a toll on one’s mental health, she admits.

“It was a disturbing, difficult and lonely phase. Lockdown made me realise that we take a lot of things for granted – family, friends, domestic help, human contact, and our sense of freedom. We get so involved in our daily routine,” she says.

Further she explains, that normally we wouldn’t pause to think about small things like cancelling plans to meet friends because we are too tired to go out; not calling up parents or loved ones daily to check on them, because of our hectic schedules; assuming that the house will be clean and the fridge will be stocked on returning home because the maid is paid a salary to do her job. But all this has changed now.

And Poi believes that it took a global pandemic and a nationwide lockdown to make her realise that things taken for granted are actually privileges and that life would be super depressing without friends
and family.

Poi also adds that this pandemic has brought to the fore the inequality that exists in this world. “Please stop taking your privileges for granted. This is the first time that scientists, doctors, front-line health workers, grocery workers and others are making sure each day that essential services are not hampered, while risking their own lives. They are actually the real warriors. Continue to give them respect even post COVID,” she says.

On a personal note, Poi was also all set to tie the knot this year, but the pandemic has put all that on hold and there is stress within the family where she is to marry into. “They have been paranoid ever since this pandemic broke out. Their stress escalated further ever since a few of my colleagues tested positive after their ICU rotation,” says Poi.

In fact, her parents and future in-laws even suggested that she quit her job and come back to Goa when they were informed about her COVID ICU duty. “But when I told them that I wish to continue they have all been extremely supportive, encouraging me through phone calls, reminding me to eat healthy and to sleep well,” she says. Even so, it does bother her when she pauses to think about everything.

“It’s annoying,” she says. “My wedding date was fixed, venue was booked, vendors were booked, invitations were printed…” Her fiancé who works abroad also cannot fly back due to travel restrictions. “And due to my commitments at the hospital I can’t fly out of the country, so now everything is up in the air,” she says, adding that now she goes with the flow, taking each day as it comes.

While she would love to enjoy the wet monsoons in Goa, Poi doesn’t know when she will get to come home again as the Pune scene is far worse than that in Goa. “It would be too optimistic to hope that all this settles in a couple of months. But if we are lucky, if cases start dropping and we somehow get a vaccine, I am hoping to be back home by the end of this year at least,”
she says.