LANSING, Mich. — As the Coronavirus pandemic continues to rise nurses across the country are springing into action to help.
Two nurses in Michigan have traveled to New Jersey to work in separate Intensive Care Units to lend a helping hand.
Right now, New Jersey hospitals are overwhelmed with Coronavirus patients.
The state has over 74,000 confirmed cases of the virus and is taking in overflow patients from New York, the epicenter of the pandemic.
Shelly May Lombrana and Denise Orweller are travel nurses from Michigan.
They said typically they try to work within a few hours of their homes but felt they needed to go to New Jersey to help.
They’re both in eight-week contracts with Hackensack Meridian Health, a hospital network in New Jersey.
Throughout the state, there are 17 hospitals under the name Hackensack Meridian Health.
Lombrana is working at Hackensack University Medical Center as an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) nurse.
Orweller is working in the ICU at Raritan Bay Medical Center, which is about a 40-minute drive south of Hackensack University Medical Center.
The 770-bed hospital is now running as a COVID-only patient building.
All non-COVID patients are moved to a separate building to prevent the spread of the virus.
Lombrana said the ICU is one of the most used units right now for COVID-19 patients and the hospital has converted most other units and offices into makeshift ICUs.
“So many patients had to be ventilated and there is such a high need for ICU nurses that they turned every unit that was not an ICU into an ICU,” said Lombrana.
She has been a travel nurse for three years and said she hasn’t seen anything like this pandemic before.
“I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen anyone pass away like this so suddenly. One minute they’re fine and the next their heart just gives out because they can’t take it anymore.”
At Raritan Bay Medical Center, Orweller just finished the first week of her eight-week contract.
She said she wasn’t scared before she came to New Jersey, but once she got there she saw how aggressive and deadly the disease can be.
“I mean if they actually really seen it, you know the patients fighting. The medical team. You know, we’re fighting for these patients to live,” said Orweller.
Both nurses have left their families to help the crisis in New Jersey.
Orweller and Lombrana said it was an easy decision to make.
Lombrana said, “I feel like I was put here for a reason and this is where I’m supposed to be at.”
Experts at Hackensack Meridian Health said ICU nurses are some of the most needed nurses right now to fight the virus.
Donna Ciufo, the Vice President of Nursing Education and Professional Development at Hackensack Meridian Health said, “We’re seeing so many more patients than we normally take care of and they’re critically ill. As they’re becoming sicker and sicker and needing to be ventilated on our respirators, we really need that skill set to take care of it. We don’t normally have that many ICU nurses.”
Hackensack Meridian Health has about 1,200 travel nurses contracted with the network to help fight the pandemic.
Cifuo said most of the ICU patients are on ventilators when normally only a small portion is.
Keeping their spirits high, Orweller found a great way to keep a smile on her face while representing her favorite Big 10 school.
She shows her Spartan pride with a Spartan medical cap.
On it displays a big green Spartan “S.”
“He’s seen my hat and he’s like ‘Oh no we’ve got a Spartan in the house,’ and I said ‘Yeah, don’t tell me you’re a Rutgers fan.’”
Orweller said personal protection equipment (PPE) is running low in some hospitals.
She said some nurses are using shower caps as medical hats.
She also mentioned a nurse had her mother make a lab coat, hat, and mask out of a shower curtain.
Orweller said the hospitals could use any kind of PPE donations.
Both Orweller and Lombrana said they will renew their contracts with Hackensack Meridian Health if the opportunity arises.
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