NEW BERN, N.C. — There is no greater indicator of how bad this pandemic can get, and be at times, than inside a hospital COVID-19 ICU. Behind the curtains of critical care are mostly unvaccinated patients fighting a virus they likely won’t survive. On the other side of the glass are doctors and nurses doing everything they can to keep them alive.
What You Need To Know
- This is an exclusive look inside a COVID-19 patient’s room at CarolinaEast Medical Center
- Bill Siegendorf is approaching a month-long stay in the hospital
- Siegendorf, 79, is vaccinated
- The CarolinaEast Medical Center has a mixed-use ICU for COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients
- Most unvaccinated patients on a ventilator do not survive
One man is fending off the virus in a unit less intense than the ICU. Bill Siegendorf has been hospitalized with COVID-19 since he entered CarolinaEast Medical Center in New Bern on September 4. He can’t breathe well yet on his own, and when he does talk, he takes pauses in between.
Siegendorf said, “This delta variant is killing people left and right. I’ve been vaccinated twice and I still got it!”
The 79-year-old man has no preexisting health conditions. Before contracting COVID-19, he had a clean bill of health. His improvement has been gradual and he can hardly leave his bed.
“I have a hard time getting from this side of the bed to the toilet. It takes me 15 minutes to catch my breath. That was a shock for me,” he said.
Siegendorf is staying in the Clinical Decision and Observation Services unit. The clinical director said this setup allows nurses to monitor patient oxygen levels from behind a glass door and do a quick once-over as needed.
It’s a routine he personally invited Spectrum News 1 to see.
Siegendorf has no choice but to wear a mask on a BiPap machine in order to push air into his lungs. If oxygen levels drop, a nurse is quick to move in to check on him. To anyone who thinks the virus is a game, Siegendorf said it’s reckless to play with your health.
“It would make me very upset to hear somebody say that, because it’s just plain stupid. You can see the results from COVID-19 and the deaths that result,” he said.
The husband, father and grandfather said he misses home and is ready to leave the hospital.
“I want out! This is awful. I don’t know how anybody can stand this room for eight weeks. It’s almost like being buried,” Siegendorf said.
ICU Nurse Manager Melinda Houston said critical care is where she doesn’t want patients like Siegendorf to end up.
Houston said, “These patients we are intubating now, they aren’t even lasting two weeks before they expire.”
Houston has been working in hospitals for 21 years. She said 17 of those years have been in the CarolinaEast ICU.
This ICU is a mixed-use population of patients infected by COVID-19 and others with sicknesses outside the virus. She said providing care for different types of patients requires great communication. Houston started her new role in early 2020.
“We’re very close here in the hospital. We’re family,” she said.
She said she hasn’t taken a long break from work recently, other than taking a day off for her birthday.
She’s been on her feet 12 or more hours a day—often seven days a week for almost the entire pandemic.
“Taking care of these patients day in and day out, it does take a toll on you. Even if you are seasoned ICU level nurse,” the manager said. “We’re human. That’s what makes us good at our job. Being human is what makes nurses the most trusted profession because we care about people.”
Health care workers are not immune to the deadly virus. In April of last year, Houston said the staff lost a friend to the disease. Now she has tattoo on her forearm that reads “Never Forgotten” to honor the memory of her friend.
“The worst day I've ever had as a nurse. I think losing somebody that you work with every day, and out like that. I mean it hits home. I mean, you know it can happen to you,” Houston said.
It’s why Houston and Dr. Roy Everett, who is the physician for this unit, advocate strongly for vaccinations.
Everett said, “Anybody who saw it up close would be the first in line to get their vaccine. I was.”
True to his word, Everett said he was the first person who took the vaccination in Eastern North Carolina last December.
“Every day you’re around COVID-19 patients and you’re not vaccinated, you’re playing Russian roulette,” he said. “The virus is not a political entity. It just wants to kill people. It doesn’t matter what party affiliation. It doesn’t matter what religion. It just wants to kill people.”
Siegendorf said he doesn’t ever want to take this delta variant lightly.
“I just want to add one thing. You don’t know what you have until you lose it,” he said.
His motivation is to leave the hospital by November 1 so he can enjoy Thanksgiving with his family.
“We have not been together as a family like we’re planning for this Thanksgiving. I can hardly wait to walk into the house and just embrace all the kids, all the adults,” Siegendorf said.
Others won’t escape ICU isolation.
"It brings tears to my eyes just to think of the joy that’s gonna bring, and I hope that I'm doing everything to make sure that I'm there,” he said.