Survivors of COVID-19 share their experience on Springboard
IT is extremely profound when people voluntarily use their pain or share their painful experiences publicly to give others a better chance to healthy living and also to influence change.
As part of its ‘behind the scenes’ series, the Springboard, Your Virtual University, a radio programme on Joy FM, used this week’s edition to talk to patients and survivors of the COVID-19 virus who used their experience to help the public gain first-hand experience and also appreciate what it was like in dealing with the virus.
The survivors shared their stories of what it meant to have the virus, the reality of having it and the mental, emotional and physical trauma it took them through.
Near death experience
Events Producer, Mr Robert Klah, sharing his experience, said: “One of the things that showed I was near death was the oxygen support system.”
“I couldn’t go off the oxygen support system for even two minutes because I think there is something called SPO2 which you are supposed to stay within the range of 96 and 100 per cent to show you are fine, but unfortunately when I got in mine was around 72 per cent so without the oxygen support I couldn’t survive.”
“There is a distilled water which they put into the system for you to use, and at one point it got finished and when it did the oxygen was no longer coming through and they had changed it and that was when I realised that even one minute off the oxygen was death because I was choking and suffocating until they changed it.”
“At another time, the cylinder through which the gas was flowing had finished and they had to change it and that was hell,” he explained.
Appreciation to doctors and nurses
Mr Klah expressed his appreciation to the doctors and nurses who were by his side during the difficult moment.
“When I came through, I told one of my colleagues that doctors are ‘demi gods’ because if you go off or about to go off life they are able to bring you back.”
“One group of people we don’t highlight are nurses but they play an extremely important role in taking care of us. They were always with me and the doctors only came in and went,” he stated.
Getting COVID in line of duty
Narrating how he got infected with COVID 19, a nurse, Mr Alfred Yanful Ahenkorah, said he got it in the line of duty.
“At my facility, there is a holding centre that was holding people who were suspected to have COVID and it was during this period that I started feeling sick but couldn’t pinpoint what was wrong.”
“I had itchy throat, cold and headache but was not feeling feverish as at then so I thought it was one of those normal things. Upon speaking to a doctor, he advised that I treat for respiratory tract infection so I started taking the medication.”
He said unknowingly to him, someone had tested positive in the unit he was working in and all of them had been asked to come and test.
“When I got the information, that was like five days of experiencing those symptoms and on that very night when I went to bed I felt severe chest pains and in the middle of the night, I could feel that I have fever so I took some paracetamol and felt a bit okay.
“Subsequently, I did the test and the results came a week and it turned out I was positive,” he stated.
Lowest moment
Mr Ahenkorah pointed out that although he was personally not scared or anxious, his greatest fear was his family and the possibility of him infecting them.
He said his lowest moment was when he couldn’t spend time with his two kids on Father’s Day because he was in isolation in the house.
“I heard the knock on the door and they started crying that they wanted to come in to see me at that point tears dropped from my eyes because I couldn’t come out and interact with my family,” he narrated.
Fear of death
Another nurse, Ms Abigail Blessing Mensah, said her experience started one morning when she had reported for work.
“I was not feeling well but because of our work I had to be strong and take care of patients. I started experiencing chest pains, dizziness, headache and severe eye pain so I went to the hospital and did a thorough test. My mind was not on COVID so I did a general test and later on I did a COVID test.
“All the other tests came out alright so one day I went to work and they told me that my results were in. I tested positive for COVID. I was admitted and it got worse. I couldn’t sleep for days and the chest and eye pains got severe.”
“At a point I felt I would possibly not make it,” she stated.
She said her one and half year-old daughter was also sick and experiencing the same symptoms.
“After my experience I now feel life is short and anything could happen. The virus is real and it kills,” she said.