Doctor Çelik, we talk regularly about your work as a senior physician in the isolation ward for Covid-19 patients at the Darmstadt Clinic.

What is the current situation?

Sebastian Eder

Editor in the Society department at FAZ.NET.

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    We were able to gradually reduce our Covid area again. This week we withdrew to a ward with the normal and monitoring ward, so we can release urgently needed bed capacities for the non-Covid area. In the intensive care unit, with a slight delay, it is to be expected that patients will soon be able to be cared for on a single ward. We allow ourselves to be infected by the general optimism and see that the incidences and new admissions are clearly declining. I'm happy about that. Sometimes, however, I am also sobered when I find out at the meeting in the morning that patients with severe courses have been admitted again. One must not forget that people continue to be infectedhave a severe course and also need to be treated in the intensive care unit. These patients are even more angry about their infection because the end of the pandemic is in sight.

    But there are no more capacity problems in the intensive care unit?

    Since last week we have no longer threatened any acute bottlenecks.

    We get the patients well relocated if necessary, but recently we had to move less to the intensive care unit than before.

    Deaths have also become rarer.

    Did Covid patients actually also die in your normal ward?

    We had significantly more deaths in both normal and intensive care units than in regular non-Covid operations. Patients don't just die in the intensive care unit. Often patients have already expressed the wish in advance that, in the event of a serious illness with no prospect of therapeutic success, for example, no mechanical ventilation or intensive care therapy should be given. In the case of pneumonia, which is reversible in principle, due to an infectious disease such as Covid-19, it is not that easy to judge when there is no prospect of success. Therefore, many standard advance directives do not help us and we have to discuss the situation with the patient or family member. In case of doubt, intensive medical measures are taken. If intensive therapy is not desired,symptom therapy can take place in the normal ward. There we then do everything we can to ensure that the patient does not feel stress, that he does not feel short of breath, that he is not afraid or in pain. Outside of the pandemic, we have often even made dying possible at home. But that is not feasible in infectious patients. Making it possible to die with dignity is part of good medicine. The pandemic doesn't make it any easier.The pandemic doesn't make it any easier.The pandemic doesn't make it any easier.

    Can relatives now say goodbye to dying Covid patients?