Medical Workers Wear Pics Of Themselves Smiling To Comfort COVID-19 Patients
For COVID-19 patients, a hospital stay can be especially scary: You’re in a foreign environment, battling a virus that didn’t exist months ago, without friends and family there to comfort you. The only people you do see are your medical team, and even they’re suited up in head-to-toe protective gear that conceals most of their faces.
San Diego respiratory therapist Robertino Rodriguez wanted to do something about that. Last week, he geared up as usual before his shift at Scripps Mercy Hospital, but then he did something a little different.
“Yesterday I felt bad for my patients in ER when I would come in the room with my face covered in PPE,” he wrote on Instagram on Saturday. “A reassuring smile makes a big difference to a scared patient. So today I made a giant laminated badge for my PPE so my patients can see a reassuring and comforting smile.”
A post shared by Robertino Rodriguez (@captain_wolf82) on Apr 4, 2020 at 8:44am PDT
In the photo on his uniform, Rodriguez wears a suit and tie and a beaming smile. It’s a seemingly small gesture but it serves to remind his patients that there’s a compassionate human under all that PPE gear.
“One thing health care workers do to make our patients feel at ease is to reassure them with our smiles but now that we have to wear masks, we are unable to do this,” he told HuffPost via email.
“A smile goes a long way in comforting a scared patient ― bringing some brightness in these dark times,” he said.
Since the weekend, Rodriguez’s post has gone viral, with over 28,000 “likes” and many grateful comments.
“The sweetest thing I’ve seen in a while.”
“This is something so simple yet so few would think of the comfort it brings patients.”
“You are the hero we need.”
Not long after he posted it, other nurses and doctors started following suit, taping photos of themselves smiling on their hospital garb.
