i just asked him about what you posted, and he verified that you’re correct. only those who worked at sgh at that critical time would know the arrangement. however, he wasn’t even fully aware patients he had seen had sars as they were supposed to be confined to a few wards. he spent his time mainly in the family medicine continuing care department or its predecessor. he’s not a surgeon thus hardly spent time at the gs department. he’s now still in family medicine practice plus cosmetic or aesthetic consultation and services not involving surgery. lasers (to remove moles and facial spots) and botox yes. a lot of botox injection appointments. makes more money from the latter.
At that time got family medicine?
Oh I think maybe he was one of those staff doctors at SGH who saw other doctors who were ill?
Ask him if he was one of those who would see SGH doctors MOs/Reg/Consultant if they had fever and then give MC?
On the day that they announced that SARS had hit SGH I remember I was on call. It was a Sunday I think. They called us all to the Level 9 of block 5? I can't remember exactly which block now. But it is the level which has this huge area we use sometimes for like staff dinners and also has lecture theatre.
Anyway they told us all about how SARS had hit SGH. And that they were going to send Team 2 or was it Team 1 ( I can't remember correctly) to TTSH to help look after some of the SARS patients that were going from SGH to TTSH. They also said that from now on will have temperature checks daily.
I remember going down for lunch at the Kofu food court. Then on the way back up to the wards there were people checking temperature! They checked mine and said I had fever! I can't remember exactly what my temp was lah. Maybe I drank hot soup? Those days we just went to work even though we were sick or had fever. Taking MC was taboo. Also it meant angering your fellow MOs because they would have to work harder to take up the slack. SGH GS ran on Teams. Team 1 to 5. Team 1 would be on call every Monday. Team 2 Tuesday. Team 3 Wed. Team 4 Thursday. Team 5 Friday. For weekends Teams took turns. Team 1 would always have to be on Sat because they would be on call again on Mondays. Team 5 would take Sundays when it was their turn for the same reasons. I was in Team 1 at the time. Vascular Team. Alex Chao had only just returned not too long from his HMDP.
Anyway they told me I cannot go up. Cannot go back to work. Had to go to see the dr. So they directed me to go see some family doctors in SGH. The doctor gave me 7 days MC I think.
I called my wife and told her. She said ok I will come pick you up. Actually I was kind of happy that I no longer had to do my call. But then I started thinking what if I really had SARS?
In the car on the way back, my wife was asking me, hey if you have SARS then you go home to my parents place then infect all of us how? We were living with my in laws. My wife's parents, her grandmother, her 2 sisters and her brother and my young daughter and son aged 2 and 1. That's a lot of people infected!
My phone rang as my wife was going round the circus at Newton. It was Prof Leo from CDC. She asked me if I am DR X and I said yes. She asked where are you now? I told her. She said, do not go home. Detour to TTSH now. You will need to stay at TTSH till you are cleared.
So my wife dropped me off close to TTSH. I still remember that walk to the TTSH white tent. It was deserted! No one in sight!
They took my vitals, took blood samples then I was shown to my hospital room. I remember walking past Dr Chng my registrar in Team 1 (she was in room next to mine) room. She had full blown SARS about a few days before this blew up.
I stayed at TTSH for about 3 days. My good friend and CG group mate gave me "Life of Pi" the book to read knowing I would be bored. The room we had did not have TV. When the results came back negative for SARS they discharged me. But I still had to be quarantined for 14 days. My wife decided it was a good time for us to move back to our flat in Bedok. So on discharge my little daughter and son and my wife picked me up and we went home to our flat. I spent another 14 days with them just really doing nothing but reflecting on life. I realized I had missed so much of my son's life in the past year as well. He was already walking. I had missed so much. And then if I really had SARS and died, what would have happened to my wife and kids?
Makes you think about life again. If not for SARS I doubt I would have had the drive and determination to leave sinkieland once and for all.
When I left SGH to stay at TTSH Alex Chao was still fine.
It was only after I came back from quarantine that I heard in the auditorium where Prof Soo said Alex has been warded. They think it is dengue.
Scary times.
My classmate just messaged saying that SGH internal medicine departments will be rostered into teams to cover isolation wards if numbers (of Wuhan coronavirus) spike. Will see how the situation unfolds this coming week.
good luck to the doctors and nurses in Singapore. Remember to protect yourselves because you cannot trust MOH or SGH or the hospital or even your Head of Department to protect you!
