Bayside hospital chaplain handles grief and trauma on the frontlines of the coronavirus fight
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Mark Daniels, a chaplain at Cohen Children’s Medical Center, serves patients and staff contending with the coronavirus. Photo courtesy of Daniels
By David Brand
The day that Mark Daniels administered last rites to a dying patient by iPad was a hard one. So was the time he learned a child at Cohen Children’s Medical Center had died from complications of the coronavirus.
There have been many painful experiences lately at Cohen, a pediatric hospital that has been transformed to serve adult patients with COVID-19 who no longer fit in the units at Long Island Jewish Medical Center next door. There have been some uplifting moments, too — like whenever the PA system plays a few bars from “Here Comes the Sun” after a patient who beat the coronavirus is discharged, said Daniels, a chaplain at Cohen.
“The impact on human beings is the piece I’m dealing with,” he said Monday during a break. “I’m dealing with people and the stressors of life.”
Each day, Daniels makes the trip from his Bayside home to serve hospital staff and patients fighting the coronavirus. He returns to his wife each night and performs an elaborate cleaning ritual — hosing off outside, sealing his hospital clothes in a plastic bag and hitting the shower.
“I’m not allowed to say hello until after I get out of the shower,” he said.
Northwell Health has treated more than 2,600 COVID-19 patients across its health network, which includes Cohen and Long Island Jewish, Newsday reported Monday.
As a chaplain, Daniels is accustomed to helping medical workers cope with the trauma of the job, and he is trained to sit with patients and their loved ones, often in the worst moments of their lives. But these days have far surpassed usual grief, he said – especially as he tends to patients forced to die in isolation, without their families beside them.
“It’s challenging to offer end of life prayers via telecommunication,” he said. “It hit me, the starkness of not being able to give touch on the shoulder, or to put your hand in someone’s hand.”
“End of life is always difficult. But this was difficulty on steroids,” he added.
More staff members are in need of support, too, he said. In fact, his main responsibility has been listening to doctors, nurses and other providers who contend with a daily death toll that more closely resembles a wartime field hospital. Medical workers are trained to compartmentalize trauma, but even they have their limits.
“They’re all human beings even though they’re medical workers,” he said. “The tension is palpable.”
Daniels expects the full emotional impact will be long-lasting for people on the frontlines of the crisis.
“I am convinced that an awful lot of staff are going to need an awful lot of assistance getting over the experience they’ve had,” he said. “In reality, it’s something we’re going to have to deal with.”
Fortunately, Daniels’ wife, two children and four grandchildren have remained healthy, but he has had to contend with the grief and secondary trauma he experiences while bolstering those around him at the hospital. He and other chaplains meet to “talk it out” and he practices self care in other ways, like sitting at home in Bayside with a martini or taking long walks.
“Walking is my way of destressing myself,” he said. “Walking mindlessly.”
After 20 minutes, it was time for Daniels to get back to work at the Nassau County hospital.
“Back to the frontlines,” he said before hanging up.
