With our national death toll now rising by roughly one thousand Americans...
Those cases add to the more than eighty nine hundred veterans...
Will be screened the husband is being able to take care of severe carving...
It's a leader's job to give hope,
and i was very worried about that because this was an unknown.
All of us were going this is going to go everywhere,
and so when it made it to Europe and then it made it to New York and then it made it to Colorado became very very real.
Things got real for us on march 9th,
because that was the first day we admitted our first COVID positive patient.
It was just interesting being on the other side of the aisle so to speak,
being the guy saying who can come in who can't see their loved ones at end of life,
and knowing that personally i was experiencing that too so...
Boy i don't know this is so resource intense. I don't know how i can keep this up for you know a week.
The supply chain at that time was unavailable.
I love history right, so you have the great debate do events create great heroes
or do great heroes create events.
Okay how can we reuse our PPE and what will work best and can we use uv lights,
and again it was just so many things that came out all at once, and you were just grasping for anything to try to make sure that our staff,
and our patients and everyone else was safe.
People are going to get sick and people are going to die, and that's on us.
Is the staff prepared did we do we have the right equipment do we have the right supplies,
or do we have the right um you know people in the right positions. Do we have the resources that we need to deal with this.
There wasn't a single person that I thought we could do without.
Really, I mean that's what you cannot prepare yourself for.
These are people's lives. It's a life. Every life,
and that's all I can think about.
There's a period of time there where every day there was a message going out,
and there were messages based in fact as we knew it as we understood it that day,
and if we don't need to use them for isolation then we don't what we plan for right for all the phases. For all the phases. Yes.
I think we were one of the few facilities that actually did a manpower pool.
Now, that means everybody in. All in, on the manpower pool, and then we tasked from the manpower pool,
that included physicians, nurses, finance folks, everybody was on the manpower pool.
I've always believed that a hospital, when it's functioning at its best,
is during a crisis but this was a crisis unlike any I have faced in my 38 years.
I could put myself in their shoes. I am a nurse,
and nursing defines how I make decisions and what I just how I do things.
um so I'm pretty proud of that. I think the best thing you can do is to be transparent.
Even though some people probably didn't think I was, I felt an obligation
for our employees to know what I knew .
The only way we were going to get through this pandemic was take each day at a time, brick by brick.
These are hard decisions, and we have your back.
You have to keep going yourself. I lived at the hospital.
I had I slept more on the floor in my office than I did at home for a period of time,
and I think you have to go out and you have to visit people and you have to show that you're in it with them.
I was exhausted as as was everyone else,
but you just you just keep getting through it because you're searching for the light at the end of the tunnel.
I've been working my whole career to be the number one to run the hospital.
to run the organization.
I never got it on active duty, but I got it here in the VA,
and so during this during this pandemic I'm the number one,
so this all at the end of the day falls on me.
So, hey, here is your chance Paul to shine,
and to lead this group of 1100 people okay,
and flipping and storm the hill and take it. I didn't get that in the Army. I got in the VA.
I need to know, what's happening at each site, with our veterans I need to know what's the need
for each site. What supplies do they need what equipment do they need,
so just tracking all of that and there wasn't a standard way to get this information,
so they had to be creative.
It was clear it was a commitment to how do I care for my veteran,
Whether you're in the EMS worker or you're one of our surgeons. All in between.
The staff knew that to take care of our veterans we got to take care of each other,
and take care of the facility to make it a safe place to provide that care.
I don't think it's any secret that there is a divide in any environment and so,
I think trying to find some way for employees to come together
and unify even with their differences.
The strength of our democracy is that people can have their own points of view,
and we wanted to respect that and at the same time we had to protect those that felt so unsafe and insecure.
We took employees who had mental health jobs and they were suddenly out in blizzards screening employees in the dark um in the cold,
and every time I was I was out there because I live on station so i'd drive through at night.
I would drive through in the cold, in the rain, in the dark, and they were like if this is what I've got to do it's what I've got to do.
Command Sergeant Major Dick Veenendall. Rest in peace.
I actually had to get involved I spent many nights there and I think
personally, for me that what hit home was when the staff was so stretched then,
that I actually had to be the one that had to carry all the veterans that had passed away to the morgue.
They're soldiers, they're sailors, they're airmen, marines.
They have been through tough times okay and when this thing hit,
it's another tough time but those people are resilient.
We'll also have you see our physical therapist since you're talking about feeling kind of a lot of this weakness.
You can work when you're scared. You can work through fear.
You can work you can be resilient you can put that face on and you can still take care of veterans.
We had nurses we had other members of facility leadership teams, and, and,
staff sit with them and spend those last hours with them, pray with them.
Those are the stories that probably mean the most to me,
because i always think about what if that was my mom, or my dad, and,
You know, you always want to live by the golden rule,
And you don't want them to just become another number but there were so many people
and everything was so busy all the time that it was you had to almost stop,
and not think about it because it would just I mean you just want to curl up and just feel bad for everybody.
I think, when you get into health care and you get into a position of leadership,
you want to go in and save the world and then sometimes you just can't.
You're always sort of watching the troops and how the troops are doing.
Our mental health resources that we have that are on board are really for our veterans,
and so now we're in a mental health situation where we need to provide mental health for our staff.
I think, employees were both traumatized personally and professionally.
Professionally, as a doctor, or a nurse, what they would struggle with
was I don't know what the answers were they would constantly be on their phones looking to see how do I treat this what do.
How do I get through this how do I be somebody's savior.
I want to know what's going on I know i'm not out there in the field but I know a lot of things about the VA,
and we want to try to make sure that we focus on your needs.
We all were going through a lot but they went through the most.
It's I haven't ever done, this but it's been it's been a hard year.
I think what this pandemic showed is that VA care is superior,
and it's superior because of the continuity of care the understanding of the patient population base.
Our employees know our veterans they care for our veterans they love our veterans.
Reaffirmation for our mission because you can't go through what we went through if you're not committed to that.
We need to take a break and take that breath and just really reflect on
what we've been through. You know mourn and what we need to mourn,
and celebrate what we need to celebrate coordinating the best package of care and services for each veteran based on their needs.
Whether that's with us in our facility or in the community.
I would ask everyone to please trust the science trust the facts.
and and know that we're here to fulfill our mission and to help our veterans to improve their well-being of their life.
There you go i know you're trying to show me your muscles, but
we have got to just roll this up here.
We got them enrolled and we give them their vaccine,
and then we we tell them about all the different services that are available to them, just
it's just full circle and it feels nice that veterans are coming to us,
and, and seeing what we can offer.
He didn't even feel it that's the way we like him.
Universally as an organization and certainly in Montana,
It's kind of changed our culture and brought everybody closer together.
We've been able to expand care out of the main facility into these community based outpatient clinics, and
that's really helped to improve our customer satisfaction.
We have to show them that we deliver the best care, and
we have to convince them that even though they could go to the private sector,
they should choose us because we do it better.
That conversation that you have with a veteran about the why
to come here is so important.
If you said to the veteran, the community does this well,
I think that maybe it would serve you better to go to the community for this,
but for this we're so much better than the community.
Our, our quality metrics are outstanding in this area and your best option would be to come to us.
I mean think about your own provider they tell you something you're going to believe it.
I do, without question because you've got that trust.
I think that this this has illustrated that the VA is a very powerful force that's a very um
it's a national resource in my opinion and I think that um I think that again through the actions of the VA not the words,
but the actions of what the VA has done I think that the public sees us in a different light.
If you're a veteran eligible for care in VISN 19,
I can assure you you'll receive the best possible health care.
We provide care second to none and the pandemic proved that.
We've always provided outstanding care but the heroism of our employees,
In the manner in which they dealt with and still do deal with the COVID pandemic,
I don't know why you would want to get care anywhere else.