Residency amidst the covid pandemic

To,

The Editor,

It was early 2020 when the world came under the grip of the deadly novel Coronavirus (Covid) – and suddenly we were living in a chapter of a history textbook – in a Pandemic. A virus relegated to the side pages of microbiology textbooks, drastically changed our lifestyle.

We joined our residency in Pediatrics at the height of this pandemic when India was caught in the first wave of Covid. Residency itself was quite overwhelming and on top of it, we were working in the “heat” of this pandemic.

COVID centers were brimming with patients. Donning masks and Personal Protective Equipment became the norm - a thing hitherto unusual in Indian clinical setting. Deploying all specialties starting from Anaesthesia to Psychiatry towards COVID care had become a rule. The humble pulse oximeter, a device limited to the confinements of the Intensive Care Units, started showing its presence in the pockets of every resident.

Away from home, surrounded by high unlit buildings of Mumbai with deserted streets, seeing the struggles of patients and health care workers alike for procuring beds and medicines, and so many lives succumbing to the virus within weeks, wasn’t easy. Our training in MBBS did not prepare us for what was waiting behind those massive gates of a covid center. Each day was an emotional and a physical roller coaster but surviving but made all of us stronger. There was a severe crunch of healthcare worker across hospitals all over India. It was the determination to fight this pandemic and treat people which made us bounce back and work like there is no tomorrow, hoping for some normalcy in the near future.

But there was light at the end of the tunnel. Finally, we had a vaccine to boost our immunity and also to nip mutants in the bud which helped to decrease the disease mortality tremendously.

Though we missed roughly a year of pediatric training, we had a different learning experience which is definitely going to refine us into more holistic health care workers. Not the usual first year of residency, but definitely a unique “tale to tell” which perhaps none of us may see in our medical careers again!