PERSONAL PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT

 

Inspired by the traumatic events surrounding the novel corona virus.

I want to commemorate the emotions I feel surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic because I have been in direct contact with patients that are COVID-19 positive. There is a massive disconnect right now between patients and caregivers. I work in a hospital and I am someone who advocates for my patients while they are under my care. In these strange times I cannot connect with them how I normally do. Physical barriers to care make me feel like a wall has been erected between them and I. I am afraid to get close, or provide care effectively due to fears of becoming sick, and potentially suffering from complications. I work in the Emergency Department of Seattle Children's Hospital.

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This invisible enemy, the virus, relates to mental health care. It is invisible and cannot physically be seen, and yet we feel the raw emotions and distress.

Figures dressed up in personal protective equipment (PPE) are trying to take care of this patient but ultimately the patient has just passed away. I want to depict the care team in the immediate aftermath, mourning among their coworkers, knowing they did what they could under the given circumstances. I want to show how scary the Controlled Air-Purifying Respirators (CAPR) and the yellow bile colored gowns are. How alien the caregivers, nurses, and doctors look. I want to show that there are no visitors for the patient; we cannot risk exposing any family members or caregivers.

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I want the emotions communicated to be loneliness, which is what I am feeling. I am "stuck" at home like so many others. I am afraid to put myself at risk further. I want to communicate what most civilians cannot see, which is the death of so many loved ones due to an invisible enemy that has swept the world, destroying so many precious lives. You cannot see the emotions or the human condition, the anger, the sadness, the grief, or the steady flow of tears. 

 

Leif

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