Stories From the Streets: Alone In the Nursing Home

My name is Gilad Hadari, and I live in a small town named Elon Moreh. My town is nestled in the hills of Samaria near the city of Nablus. I’m a divorcee and have three young children with whom I was supposed to spend a recent weekend—after all, it was my birthday.

But my plans changed dramatically on Friday afternoon after I received a phone call just before Shabbat began from the head of United Hatzalah’s Bnei Brak chapter, Ephraim (Effy) Feldman. Effy and I have known each other for a long time, as I have been volunteering with United Hatzalah for close to 12 years now.

Effy knew I was a registered nurse and have experience working in a nursing home. He asked if I would be willing to come down to Bnei Brak, some 70 kilometers (or 44 miles) away, to take over for the medical staff of a nursing home. The staff had all called in sick, as many of them had contracted COVID-19 or were in forced home isolation, and there was no one to manage the home.

On Thursday night the city of Bnei Brak was put on lockdown by the Israeli government due to the rampant virus outbreak permeating the city. Officials in the health ministry speculated that 75,000 residents of the city had the virus, and there simply weren’t enough testing kits to get to them all. Many were left untested. The IDF and the Home Front Command took over running the city. No one was allowed in or out without their travel being deemed absolutely necessary. 

It was into this bedlam that I ventured. Effy sent an ambulance to transport me from my home to Bnei Brak. Because it was Shabbat, and according to Jewish law, I wasn’t allowed to take any nonessential items with me—no personal belongings, no food, just my phone, as I would need that to communicate with social services and Home Front Command and update them about what was happening.

When I arrived at the home, I found I was the only medical staff at the location. The manager of the home was there, but he and I were alone. He had no medical training and was not allowed to perform even the most basic medical tasks required by patients. There weren’t any available auxiliary staff.

Of the home’s residents, around 70% are invalids. I grabbed the files of each of the patients and went over them one at a time to familiarize myself with who needed which medication and what medical conditions to expect. After running a quick inventory, I realized we didn’t have enough masks or full protective gear for me and the manager to make it through the weekend. 

I called social services and the Home Front Command and told them I needed a lot more supplies. There was no food for me personally, and patients needed their diapers changed. Some hadn’t been changed for 12 hours.

Some time later a nursing student from Ichilov Hospital came from Tel Aviv, and we worked together tirelessly until 2 a.m., when he had to leave so he could make his shift the next day at the hospital. I was once again alone with the manager of the home. Over the course of the night, we attended to each patient’s needs, and I prepared medications for each patient according to their chart. However, I relied on the manager to tell me which patient was whom. We went person by person and made sure everyone was comfortable and received their proper meds. 

In the morning another nurse arrived for an eight-hour shift. We worked together and continued providing care for the patients. But then she too left. After that I was on my own until Sunday night, working and caring for patients nonstop. There was no other medical or auxiliary staff present. Usually the nursing home has a team of four nurses and numerous auxiliary staff, but everyone who was supposed to work over the weekend had contacted the virus or was in home isolation due to being in close proximity with someone who had.

By Saturday morning I had two patients whom I suspected of having contracted the virus—they were displaying symptoms associated with the disease. I contacted the chief officer of the medical station in the city and requested two ambulances be sent to take these patients to a hospital in Tel HaShomer. In the end one person had contracted the coronavirus, but the other person didn’t. This caused the medical center to send teams to test all the home’s residents. I too was tested, but my test was lost, and therefore when everyone received their results on Saturday night (thankfully everyone else was negative), I didn’t get any results at all. After calling to inquire what my results were, I was told my test had never made it to the lab but was lost on the way. I continued caring for my charges over the next day, providing medication for those who needed them and assisting others with their basic needs as well. 

Over the course of Saturday, a day when religious Jews traditionally don’t use the phone, I received 250 calls from worried family members, the Home Front Command, the IDF, and social services from the city, all wanting to know what was happening and what was needed. Often when I told them what was needed, they said they would do their best to provide it but didn’t really follow through. I had to make do with what I had. 

On Sunday night I was relieved by a skeleton team. I had been awake and working for more than 48 hours. I went home and slept for a few hours and then went shopping. I’m trying now to get myself tested, but my medical clinic told me that if I am not showing active symptoms, then they won’t issue a test for me, as tests are scarce throughout Israel. The ambulance service has told me the same thing.

On Monday I finally got to spend some time with my children, who all asked me how my weekend was. There was no real way to explain to them what had transpired. My children range in age from 4–6 years old. The only thing I could tell them after a weekend like this was, “It is always important to help others whenever you get the chance. Just like I save lives as an EMS first responder, I also save lives as a nurse, and that is what I was doing over the weekend.”

My children all looked at me and gave me a big group hug before running off to play some more. While it wasn’t ideal for me to miss my weekend with them, in time they will understand why I did it. That may be the most important message I could ever teach them. 

Gilad Hadari is a volunteer responder with United Hatzalah in Elon Moreh, Israel.