‘IT’S AN ABSOLUTE
Brooklyn’s fi rst responders reeling
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COURIER L 4 IFE, APRIL 17-23, 2020
BY JESSICA PARKS
Ambulances in Brooklyn
are being delayed by up to two
hours as emergency rooms
are overrun with a massive
infl ux of patients infected
with the novel coronavirus,
according to statistics from a
fi rst responders union.
“Generally an ambulance
used to get in and out between
20 to 30 minutes, now
it’s like an hour to two hours
depending on the severity,”
said Vinny Variale, FDNY
EMT and president of the Uniformed
EMS Offi -
cers Union.
Protocol
requires the
city’s paramedics
to
wait with patients until the
hospital has an available bed
— and the above-average wait
times force crucial emergency
services to be held up in hospital
parking lots, rather than
responding to other emergency
calls.
“Longer wait times keep
an ambulance at the hospital
longer, and unable to go
back in service,” Variale said.
“I can’t respond to the next
call.”
Wait times in Brooklyn are
second in the city to neighboring
Queens, which recorded
the highest average delays in
the Five Boroughs as the area
becomes a national hotspot
for the pandemic, which is
compounded by the low volume
of nearby hospitals,
said Variale.
“It is really
Wyckoff Hospital nurses
demand more staff, supplies
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
Nurses and administrators
at the Wyckoff Heights
Medical Center on April 10
called on government offi -
cials to supply the hospital
with more staff, equipment,
and COVID-19 tests as the facility
grapples with a surge
in patients due to the outbreak.
The lack of suffi cient staff
and supplies has left workers
at the hospital on Bushwick’s
Stockholm Street
scrambling to adjust to the
new conditions, according
to one nurse, who said that
staff were given scant preparation
to fi ght the virus.
“There was no retraining,
no anything,” said Dalia
Branford. “It was an absolute
nightmare. I literally cried at
the end of my shift.”
Branford has been working
as a pediatric nurse for
the past decade, but had to
relearn treating adults when
she found her pediatric unit
had been converted into a
coronavirus facility.
“I had to relearn it while I
have a patient who is my responsibility,”
Branford said.
Another nurse in the
hospital’s intensive care
unit said that she and her
colleagues are spread troublingly
thin.
“You do what needs to be
done, but you now have to
split your time between four
patients. You move from one
to the next, it’s almost like an
assembly line,” said Coleen
Peters. “Sometimes it’s so
busy you don’t have time for
A protester outside Wyckoff
Heights Medical Center.
Corey Finger, NYSNA
bathroom breaks or lunch.”
The hospital has also
struggled to provide the necessary
amount of personal
protective equipment, such
as masks, face shields, and
gowns, said Branford.
Staff are only provided
with one N95 mask and one
pair of scrubs per 12-hour
shift, she said.
“If I’m perspiring through
it where it’s literally clinging
to my skin, you can’t ask me
to re-wear it,” Branford said.
“It’s not sanitary. I’m going
to make myself ill, my coworkers,
and my patients.”
The protesters also demanded
that more frontline
healthcare workers get
tested for COVID-19.
“This is horrible given
that we live in the 21st century
and in a fi rst world
country,” she said.
Wyckoff Heights Medical
Center did not respond to requests
for comment.
Ambulances delayed,
EMTs short staffed
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