Last month, I watched a YouTube video with two physicians, ZdoggMD (Zubin Damania) and Vinay Prasad, both active on social media, discussing Prasad’s perspective that allowing patients “to die alone is a human rights violation.” He argued that clinicians should not accept blanket rules from administrators and believes there are ways around what seems to have been standard practice in hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic.

So when we asked on AJN’s Facebook page (December 13), “Should hospitals allow patients with Covid-19 to have visitors?”, I was surprised that the comments were split. Many respondents supported the need for patients to be able to have loved ones with them, but many others felt visitors shouldn’t be allowed because PPE was scarce or because visitors didn’t follow rules and, as one commenter noted, “We don’t have time to be the PPE police.”

No one should die alone.

Nurses have been assisting patients to connect with family members by tablets or mobile phones, or in many cases filling in as surrogate family at the time of death. A colleague told me that in her ICU, nurses decided no one would die alone and made sure that one member of the staff was there with the patient. And while this was comforting to many families, I […]