V IP P S P OT LIG H T
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IMAGE BY DR. SAIRA RAHMAN
Honoring Physician Trainees Lost To Covid-19 Wri t t en by D r. Pa mel a W i bl e
r. Christopher Firlit, age 37, a PGY6 senior oral maxillofacial surgery resident in Detroit, Michigan, was to graduate in 3 months. He developed a fever and his chief fellow drove him to Providence Hospital where he died on April 3 of suspected COVID-19. He was employed at Ascension MacombOakland Hospital. He leaves behind his wife and three children. An Anesthesia Resident in New York City has been reported to have died of COVID-19. A mother, she leaves at least one child behind. An Internal Medicine Resident in New York City has been reported to have died of COVID-19. A PGY1 male, age 26, with no underlying health conditions ended up on ecmo (a heart-lung by-pass machine) at Montefiore Medical Center where he died on April 3 from a catastrophic brain bleed, according to an ICU doctor. As an International Medical Graduate (IMG) from Pakistan, his visa is sponsored by his employer, reported to be Elmhurst 1 0 | A P RI L / M AY 2 0 2 0
Hospital (Mount Sinai Health System). Recently married, his spouse may now be deported. It’s been more than two weeks. No media outlets have covered these New York resident physician deaths. Why? Hospitals are censoring doctors—threatening termination for breaching “media guidelines” if they speak to reporters. So physicians have asked me (in emails published with permission below) to honor our fallen physicians: “I am a resident in NYC. We have heard of multiple resident doctor deaths in the past 2 days (outside of my hospital system). We have heard rumors of gag orders being placed, preventing any publicity around their deaths. It is unclear if they had access to PPE. Could you advise how to stop these resident deaths from remaining secrets when they deserve to be honored? Is there a news outlet we can talk to to publicize this? Please keep me anonymous. Thank you for your help.” “I am sure others might have contacted you about this issue already because of all of the work you have done on the topic
of resident/student deaths from suicide and how it’s not talked about. I am a member of a COVID-19 group on Facebook that has mentioned possibly 3 or 4 medical residents dying from COVID-19 in the last 7 days. In the news there has been one death acknowledged-—Dr Firlit from Detroit. I don’t know if there are actually 3 more young trainees who have succumbed to this but I work with residents/fellows/students and am hoping to prevent further devastating loss. Thank you.” “Dr. Wible, I was wondering if you’ve been hearing about the eerie silence around resident physician deaths (and physician deaths in general) during the pandemic. It seems that every resident I’ve spoken to here on the East Coast knew within a day that 2 residents had died from COVID-19 after being on the frontlines, but our hospital administrators have been silent. In fact, I know a resident who tweeted a text screenshot from a friend who had heard the news, and is now being reprimanded by her department and was asked to delete the tweet. The most suspicious part of me is concerned that hospitals are working to keep these sto-
