I enjoyed learning a new role during the pandemic

paulina roa Midwife Bupa Santiago Hospital

Before this, I worked as an emergency midwife in the same clinic. In June, I was asked to take on a new position to help with the pandemic. I was just coming to the end of my maternity leave at home. My baby girl is 8 months and I have another girl of 4 years old. I had the right to continue with my leave, but when I received the call and asked take the helm and to be a resident midwife, I said: Yes, let’s do this, I accept the challenge. It is a challenge, mainly because being a lead midwife can be more difficult, and because there were some new procedures. But it was a really rewarding role, and I was able to rub shoulders with different leaders in different services. It was a great atmosphere, in spite of the situation we were going through. My work was to manage the beds across the clinic, as well as staffing, and you get an overall perspective and do a bit of everything in the clinic. You are in charge. It is hard work, because you are in charge of planning and you have to help deal with any problems as they arise in any of the areas. What we do as residents is receive all the teams, go through each service looking at staffing, beds, whether there are going to be any potential problems and such. You become like a mother in the company. One of the most difficult things I had to contend with was that when a patient died of Covid, the resident had to be an eye-witness. You had to console the families, many of whom had not seen the person before they died. It was the last chance to do your bit for them

at such a difficult time. Nobody teaches you how to console families, especially in a situation like this, so you have to improvise. Sometimes their situations are so sad and you really feel for them. I For seven months I would think to myself: If I was that person, what would didn’t see my parents, I want someone to say, or what would I need? Sometimes because both are at-risk, I would just listen, because words were not enough, and they just needed to feel like someone was there for as they have cancer. them, which made them feel better. Feeling listened to I preferred not to see and understood helped them more than words. Yet you had to console them whilst social distancing, and that is them because I love difficult. I would hug you if I could, but I can’t. But I am them. It was hard. here.

Nobody prepares you for such a time, for such a huge health crisis. Your emotions are complicated. Sometimes you say to yourself: Marcela in room 540 could be my mother and she is going through this. It is really shocking. You cry afterwards because you don’t want to make things worse – you are there to help. But it’s difficult, and it gets to us all. Even though it is hard, I have enjoyed this role, although there are things I didn’t know, but the experience has helped me develop. Midwives have some autonomy and this prepares you for decision making, which you have to do constantly in this crisis. On a personal note, it was quite difficult to leave my daughters 24-hours a day. I did all my work at the hospital and during my breaks, I had to express milk, because my little one was allergic to milk protein, so I couldn’t stop giving her breast milk. My husband was massively supportive. He told me he would look after the girls. He is a dentist and at the beginning he couldn’t open his surgery. He was with them for the first month. Then he was able to go back to work and my cleaner helped with the girls. She and my husband were a tremendous help. My 4 year old daughter found it difficult not having mama there at night. I usually lie down with them and read them a story. The littlest one cried a lot before going to sleep, but my husband was able to give her lots of comfort. When I got home, I had been awake for 24-hours, but I would take a shower and start the day playing with my daughters. At the end of such a long period of time awake, I was very tired. For seven months I didn’t see my parents, because both are at-risk, as they have cancer. I preferred not to see them because I love them. It was hard not to have them there for me, and my daughters didn’t really understand why they couldn’t see their grandparents.

SANTIAGO — CHILE

It was tough, but it was a good opportunity, because it has helped me get where I am today, a supervising midwife with shifts that suit me much better and no more night shifts. At the clinic we are getting ready for the second wave. Someone said, we are going back into this really difficult situation, perhaps with a different perspective but also perhaps more tired, because we all had such a big shock. The biggest impact it has had on healthcare workers is stress. We are exhausted. Some people still can’t see their family, and that is very stressful, because family are often your support circle, and the people you would normally count on. I am grateful for the experience of working with really good teams who gave 200% of themselves to help us through this crisis. I confirmed that midwifery is what I love, especially as I got to work in management. I think I was able to make a contribution. �