After our time on the floor, we gather in a small lounge to discuss our patients and experiences, and to eat lunch. After the patient Jaime and I had this week, I was grateful for the time to reflect and debrief and process what we had experienced.

We cared for a woman with advanced metastatic ovarian cancer. Needless to say, she was very sick - her kidneys were failing, she was on a ventilator for respiratory failure, small bowel obstruction, contact isolation because of pneumonia caused by MRSA, stage IV pressure ulcer on her sacrum, and in a lot of pain. It's hard not to feel helpless. You want to work miracles for people and make them better, but in the end, you can only give them the best care that you are able to give, and that's what we tried to do.

I could write pages and pages on the experience. It tore me up. To me the worst part about it was the isolation. In what might be her last days, at the worst point in her awful disease, everyone has to wear a gown and gloves when they're around her, even her family. And worse than that, she cannot speak because of the tracheostomy. She has a dry erase board, but it was very difficult for her to write, and very difficult for others to read. Before we were done for the day, she asked for her board, and wrote something like "There is grass outside. Wheelchair. We have wheelchair." She just wanted to go home.

I don't want this blog to turn into a maudlin display of empathy, but a sincere reflection on what I'm experiencing and learning right now. So that's what I experienced this week. And I learned that this is going to be even harder than I thought.