“Given the fact that we've experienced rising cases and hospitalizations, there's no doubt that the numbers of deaths will rise,” said Dr. Jonathan Samet, dean of the Colorado School of Public Health in a remote update. “I hope that our numbers are overestimates, but I think we're facing a number of deaths that's far greater than we would like to experience.”
“Certainly the hope would be to stop it in its tracks — to hopefully reverse that and really get this disease back under control, because it is a preventable disease in these high-risk populations,” said Zadvorny, who is a faculty member at the CU Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Despite all of the dire warnings, November 2020 is not April 2020. Doctors have learned a lot about how to treat COVID-19 in six months, said Dr. Richard Zane, chair of the department of emergency medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. “We are much better at recognizing critical illness, anticipating critical illness,” he said “We are much more confident in our ability to treat patients with COVID and have an understanding of what we need to do.”
Dr. Abigail Lara, a pulmonary critical care physician at UCHealth, is the daughter of immigrant parents from Mexico. She was the first in her family to go to college, the first to go to grad school, and today not only is she a doctor, but she’s also an associate professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine.
The state will suspend or cut funding for drug abuse prevention and treatment programs created by six recent laws, totaling about $26 million in reductions, according to Rob Valuck, director for the Center for Prescription Drug Abuse Prevention at the CU Skaggs School of Pharmacy. It could affect everything from public health campaigns to syringe exchange programs. “We know if there aren’t as many harm reduction services, people will invariably have to reuse equipment, they’ll be reusing needles, at increased risk of spreading disease like HIV and hepatitis C,” Valuck said.
You might say nursing is the family business. Gordon-Norby’s father and grandmother were nurses. The graduate of the University of Colorado College of Nursing has already had several job interviews. “The thought of joining correctional nursing right now, during a pandemic, I guess it's terrifying. Because everyone is in such close quarters and so that's scary. But then also I would be proud to be able to jump into that response,” she added.
Dr. Hillary Lum, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, said people should make decisions based on their perception of the quality of life. “The questions about a do not resuscitate order are emotional and important to have accurate information,” Lum said. “Thinking about whether someone wants a do-not-resuscitate or not should be related to what is the likelihood of that procedure being beneficial to a person who restarts their heart and lungs but also return to a life that they value.”
“They appear during what are called mass casualty events when there are large-scale hazards that cause larger than normal numbers of patients to need intensive care,” said Glen Mays, chair of the Department of Health Systems, Management and Policy at The University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Center.
