UCI Podcast: On the front lines of COVID-19
UCI Health’s Dr. Robert Rowe describes treating patients in ‘the epicenter of the epicenter’ of coronavirus infections in the U.S.
If you were to point out on a U.S. map where COVID-19 has hit the hardest, it would be New York City. And that’s where Robert Rowe, a critical care fellow and attending physician in emergency medicine with UCI Health, volunteered his services: in the intensive care unit at Queens’ Elmhurst Hospital Center. The Elmhurst neighborhood has been called “the epicenter of the epicenter” of coronavirus infections in the country. Rowe joins the UCI Podcast to discuss working 12-hour shifts for a week straight, seeing severely ill COVID-19 patients, many of whom died. While coronavirus cases are proportionately lower in Orange County than in other areas of the nation, he warns residents to continue to practice social distancing and other behaviors to stem the disease’s spread.