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'I wish they could be at home' | Triad nurse spends Christmas Eve treating coronavirus patients

Working on Christmas Eve isn't unusual for healthcare workers but one ICU nurse said it feels very different this year as COVID-19 hospitalizations rise.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — Christmas Eve feels different for many of us this year.

While working on the holiday isn't unusual for healthcare workers, this time they are on the frontlines of the pandemic.

"The whole feeling around the hospital is just sadness," Monzerrat Mesalles Parjeles said.

Mesalles Parjeles worked Christmas Day in 2019 but she said her shift Thursday was not anything like it was last year.

Doctors in Novant Health Forsyth Medical Center usually dress up on the holidays and hand out candy canes. She and her co-workers try to spread cheer with treats.

But this time--full personal protective gear and safety protocols do not have room for wearing Santa hats.

"I look at my patients today and I wish that they could be at home with their families but instead they're here," Mesalles Parjeles said.

She said it comes as part of a year of life changes. She buys her groceries online, works out at home and doesn't go out with her friends. Meanwhile,the battle continues inside her ICU unit.

"We've actually had to expand our ICU beds to accommodate more patients coming in," Mesalles Parjeles said.

She still tried to find ways to spread cheer to those patients.

"We try to limit our time, and our exposure by being in the room less but I think a lot of our people have been in isolation for so long," Mesalles Parjeles said, "I think it's been very important just connecting with our patients on a different level. Asking them about their families, asking them about their kids. What do you do on the holidays?"

She is starting to see hope on the horizon for the new year. She got her first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on December 18.

"It was really emotional, I'm not gonna lie. I got a little teary-eyed," Mesalles Parjeles said.

Still, she doesn't feel completely relieved yet. While she and her coworkers spend the night before Christmas inside the hospital walls, she worries others will not be careful enough gathering with family.

"The more familiar you are with someone, the more you trust them so you're like, well they're not sick so I should be fine but really we just don't know. Even when I go around my own family, I'm never not wearing a mask," Mesalles Parjeles said. 

What she wants for Christmas is for us to follow those familiar three w's and see a happier and healthier new year.

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