DR . �D�� ��RRE�� |
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COURTESY OF JEFF RHO�E�HOLY NA�E �E�ICAL CENTER |
federal stockpile were unusable , and put into storage in case of dire need .
Ecker learned of a biomedical engineer who refurbishes donated medical equipment for overseas charities , and the man and his son drove up from Arkansas with 1� refurbished ventilators . They parked their �V in the hospital parking lot and helped set up the hospital ’ s newly created IC� beds .
Jarrett , who worked 48 days straight at the outset of the pandemic , never became infected with COVID-1� . �e escaped illness despite his contact with Michael Maron , the hospital ’ s president and CEO , who fell sick along with his family . The two shared many meetings and public appearances , including a ride from a CNN interview at a time when Maron would have been contagious .
In all , 3�5 members ofthe �oly Name staff tested positive for antibodies after the first wave of the pandemic , a signal that they had been infected .
An internal medicine specialist by training , Jarrett became the hospital ’ s chief medical officer in�010 after holding the same position for five years at a small hospital in upstate New York . �e previously practiced in�idgewood and Midland Park .
�n the Time of C���D came about asthe result of conversations with friends at a socially distant outdoor dinner over the summer at �osengren ’ s Glen �ock home .
As Jarrett answered questions about the hospital and the pandemic , �osengren told him he should write abook . Soon they were meeting for four hours at a stretch every Tuesday and Sunday . Both are first-time authors .
�osengren asked questions and took notes , they wrote chapters and exchanged
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them , and by Thanksgiving the book was finished . After friendly rejections from a few publishers , the two published it themselves on Amazon , which enabled them to beat the crop of pandemic chronicles that are expected to appear in print this year .
It became almost like therapy ,” Jarrett says of the writing process , noting that there was time to work on the book during the summer and fall , because of the downturn in COVID cases .“ It wasn ’ t really about selling lots of books . It was about memorializing the experience .”
In the book , he notes that he realized the hospital was facing a crisis a few days after the first COVID patient was admitted on March 4 . The plan �six beds for COVID inthe Emergency Department � was quickly outstripped . Triage tents were erected in the parking lot . Within 10 days , �oly Name had 3� likely COVID patients , and many more to come .
One night in those early days , Jarrett went home and wept �the first time he had felt such despair since his work with AIDS patients at a New York hospital in the 1�80s .
The patients lost to COVID during the pandemic ’ s first wave are now memorialized in the red lights that form a heart on the ankh symbol that shines nightly atop the hospital . More numerous white lights �symbolizing the patients who recovered �surround them .
As the anniversary of that first COVID patient ’ s admission passed this month , the physician-author says he felt no cause for celebration .
“ We ’ re still losing patients at�oly Name ,” Jarrett says . “ It ’ s hard to do anything but put your head down and take care of people .” ❖
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