NATIONAL NURSES WEEK
Gay Nurses Bring it Home in the Coronavirus Crisis
Providing in-home care for COVID-19 and other patients during a pandemic
BY MATT TRACY
It has become a ritual at hospitals across
the nation: A recovered coronavirus patient
exits the facility to a cheering sendoff
from hospital staff — a glimmer of
hope in an era that has been dominated by
themes of morbidity.
What happens when the cheering stops,
however, doesn’t always follow the same course:
Sometimes it represents the closing of a horrifi c
chapter and a return to normalcy, but other
times it means a transition from inpatient care
to in-home care overseen by a crew of nurses
who quietly make sure those individuals continue
on the path to recovery. Nurses are also
called on to care for COVID-19 patients who are
still showing symptoms of illness but got sent
home because of overcrowded hospitals.
Countless medical professionals, including
queer nurses, have risked and lost their
lives in the fi ght against the coronavirus. Out
gay Mount Sinai RN Kious Kelly, for example,
died of the coronavirus in March after weeks of
working without suffi cient personal protective
equipment.
Other LGBTQ nurses are also playing a pivotal
role in the fi ght against the coronavirus,
including outside of the hospital environment.
A handful of out gay nurses with the Visiting
Nurse Services of New York (VNSNY) spoke to
Gay City News detailing their own journeys
visiting the homes of more than a half dozen
patients a day during the coronavirus crisis, including
patients who have the virus. The nurses,
equipped with cultural competency training
from Advocacy & Services for LGBT Elders
(SAGE), help provide care for patients and communicate
with doctors to coordinate medical
game plans.
“We put together a plan of care specifi c to
each patient,” said Mike Guglielmelli, an out
gay registered nurse (RN) who is serving patients
in Staten Island. “Every day we actually
get more and more referrals for patients who are
COVID-positive.”
It can often take days or weeks for the most
updated coronavirus numbers to be refl ected
in statistical breakdowns because the virus, as
rapid as it moves, can take some time to show
up as well as to dissipate. And nurses are also
seeing an uptick in their share of coronavirus
patients because those who were admitted to
hospitals in previous weeks are getting discharged.
“We had some patients on ventilators for two
weeks and are fi nally getting better,” said Guglielmelli,
who explained that the nurses are
tasked with managing the patients’ symptoms
PHOTO VNSNY
Out gay RN Mike Guglielmelli said he is handling an uptick in
COVID-19 patients who have been discharged from hospitals but
still need care as they recover.
to the best of their abilities.
Diarrhea and shortness of breath are among
symptoms the nurses have encountered. Some
patients already had comorbidities like emphysema
and therefore suffer from compromised
lungs, requiring nurses to employ breathing
techniques and specialized care.
“I have an 87-year-old patient who is still on
oxygen,” said Cidric Trinidad, an out gay RN
who visits patients in the embattled Queens
neighborhoods of Elmhurst and East Elmhurst,
Astoria, Woodside, and Jackson Heights. Trinidad
said his patient is continuing to suffer
shortness of breath, coughing, and other complications.
These nurses do not just care for the patients
and clock out at the end of the day. They are responsible
for working with their patients’ families,
educating them on the patients’ unique
needs, and doing what is necessary to ensure a
seamless transition into independence.
An important part of the work, Guglielmelli
said, is successfully navigating the homes of every
patient and respecting their surroundings.
“We are in their homes and this is their environment,”
Guglielmelli said. “So we have to
adapt as humans and as clinicians to their
needs and how they operate at home.”
Inclusivity is another factor in the nurses’
work, and while it is not always known whether
a patient is a member of the LGBTQ community,
many nurses make it a point to show solidarity
by donning Rainbow pins and certainly
respecting Rainbow Flags that are on display
in patients’ homes. It is not lost on them that
the LGBTQ community suffered unnecessary
hardships during the height of the AIDS crisis
when countless individuals were neglected in
healthcare settings and ignored by government
and public health leaders.
Some LGBTQ nurses who worked on the
frontlines of the AIDS crisis and are now in the
fi ght against coronavirus are seeing striking
similarities between the two crises.
“Unfortunately what I see is many of the
same social determinants of health that were
not corrected after the HIV/ AIDS epidemic,”
said VNSNY’s LGBTQ program director, Arthur
Fitting, an RN whose job entails managing the
organization’s approach to queer health issues
and providing outreach to community partners
such as SAGE, GRIOT Circle, and GMHC. Fitting
cited inadequate healthcare coverage, an
unprepared healthcare system, the lack of support
systems for patients, and even issues impacting
the medical professionals themselves,
such as a shortage of personal protective equipment.
“I don’t have the words to describe it,” Fitting
said “It’s been extremely diffi cult.”
Fitting also pointed to similarities in the
government’s response during both crises. The
Trump administration repeatedly downplayed
the coronavirus crisis from the beginning and
has mishandled the response entirely, while
President Ronald Reagan — who combined a
harmful abstinence-only approach to sex education
with a detrimental war on drugs — did
not mention AIDS publicly until 1985 (and then
only in response to a reporter’s question) while
HIV/ AIDS had already wreaked havoc on the
community for four years.
Fitting described the parallels as “astounding,”
saying that the slow reaction times in both
eras resulted in “a tremendous negative impact.”
While the issues Fitting mentions are stubbornly
persistent on a broader level, he said
the team at VNSNY has worked to at least ensure
their patients are not met with the same
injustices. Not only are nurses trained in cultural
competency, but VNSNY is partnering
with groups from the queer community to help
provide LGBTQ-specifi c bereavement services,
and VNSNY offers its own palliative care and
bereavement support.
➤ VISITING NURSES, continued on p.17
May 7 - May 20, 2 14 020 | GayCityNews.com
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