The Anxiety of Being a Doctor With a Compromised Immune System
A physician shares her pandemic story
Doctors didn’t know what we were doing those first few weeks of the pandemic. I’d argue that we still don’t really know what we’re doing, but at least now we have a bit of experience. Physicians like me have our years of training and our fount of clinical knowledge, but this virus caught us completely off guard. In the beginning of the pandemic nothing seemed to be certain except that it was unlike anything that we’d ever seen, and that it was deadly. Each day brought a slew of new casualties and case reports. We quickly learned how much of a threat Covid-19 was to health care providers and other essential workers. Especially to those with preexisting conditions like me.
I had cancer. It has been years since my diagnosis, but my illness left me with scars that I’ll carry for the rest of my life. Not to mention the list of conditions that developed as a result of the tumor and my treatment. My medical record is a horror story told through clinic notes and ICD-10 codes. My cancer: “D44.7 — SDHC-related hereditary paraganglioma.” My stroke: “I69.33 — history of cerebrovascular accident with residual deficit.” Fourteen more codes tell stories of my arm weakness and paresthesia, of my difficult airway and obstructive sleep apnea, of my health-related…
