15 Exhausted, angry, but still doing the job. That's how two leaders at Lakeridge Health describe the mindset of employees at the facilities as the Omicron variant has fuelled a surge in patients in recent days. Dr. Tony Stone said staff are merely getting by. "I'm going to be honest and say the staff is exhausted. Who hasn't had enough of this pandemic? Even our leaders are exhausted," Lakeridge's chief of staff said. "At every level of the organization, people have been working so hard to serve the community. They're just exhausted. Most importantly, our front line is tired. We are doing everything we can to support them and we'll continue to work on that, including trying to talk to them and listen to them. We have every intention of figuring our way through this. We'll do it together, but they're tired." On Dec. 24, there were seven patients with COVID-19 at Lakeridge Health sites. On Monday, Jan. 10, there were 126. Petrina McGrath, the chief nursing executive, said, "Our health-care workers, and I say that broadly, are exhausted mentally as well as physically exhausted. We're like everybody ... being hit by the staff absences and the sacrifice of our families." McGrath said the hospital was dealing with staff shortages before Omicron hit. "When you're down three or four staff on a clinical unit, whether it's nurses or others, you have to make adjustments to what you can do. You need to work in a different way, so for many, they are needing to delegate things to other providers. They have to make decisions about what's the most critical aspect of care to provide first," she noted. "It's hard in the sense they have to make these decisions in the moment. Sometimes, they're having to go to help in other areas, which might not be the area they normally work in. All of that is physically and mentally exhausting," McGrath said. After speaking with nurses, McGrath said they're exhausted. "They're, sometimes, very angry and rightly so. Many are giving up family time, they're working overtime. Even if they're not working overtime, they are working with half the staff than they would have worked with before, so the shifts are long and hard," she said. "Most of all, they're tired and they want it to get better. As a leader, it's hard to watch them, to watch this. It's hard because you know they want to come in and give their best and they're working in imperfect conditions and it's morally distracting," McGrath added. A nurse in a TV interview said the staff shortages was an emergency, an assessment McGrath agrees with. "It is absolutely an emergency. I don't think you can call it anything but an emergency. RNs (registered nurses) and RPNs (registered practical nurses) are looking after sometimes double the patients they would have looked after before," she said. Given the situation, McGrath said people should only head to a hospital if it's an actual emergency. "We really need people to not come to our emergency department unless they really require emergency services. If they're not feeling well and can go to an urgent care clinic and access virtual care, use those as the first place to go if they are feeling unwell. We really need to maintain some capacity in our emergency department to we can see those critical traumas and those critical emergencies," she said. Like others in the health field, McGrath wants those unvaccinated to get the jab. If someone hasn't been vaccinated, they should. And, people who have received two doses should get their booster shot, she added. "Staff are under such pressure and they're trying so hard to deliver services and we appreciate their patience. For many, it's long waits and we appreciate their patience." DURHAM HEALTH-CARE WORKERS RUNNING ON FUMES KEITH GILLIGAN kgilligan@ durhamregion.com NEWS Petrina McGrath, the chief nursing executive at Lakeridge Health, said nurses and other staff are physically and emotionally exhausted as they deal with a surge in COVID-19 patients brought on by the Omicron variant. Lakeridge Health photo A Whitby resident has created a "virtual seniors centre" where older adults can pop in for live classes on everything from Pilates and painting to ukulele and bread baking. Jen Tindall launched Art Your Service: Virtual Classes and Socials for 55+ in 2020 as a pandemic pivot. It started with 20 seniors and has now grown to about 400 subscribers from all over Ontario and beyond. Tindall has a background in arts programming and worked at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto, for years running classes and groups for seniors. The pandemic inspired her to put those skills to use in a new way. "I was hearing from seniors how isolated they felt," she explains. "I wanted to find a way to bring fitness and creativity and connection right into their homes to help them physically and mentally." Tindall is a strong proponent of programming for seniors that is meaningful and age-appropriate. Art Your Service offers two live virtual classes a day, five days a week with a fitness class in the mornings, and a lecture, social gathering or creative class in the afternoons. Recent options have included batch cooking healthy soups and stews, sewing projects, book lectures, painting, yoga and trivia. Classes are taught by experts in the fitness and creative aging fields. Starting this week, Art Your Service programs will be available free to Ontario long-term-care and retirement homes to help ease the strain of lockdowns and staff shortages. Tindall has also brought college students studying therapeutic recreation on board to develop virtual programming for long-term-care homes as a way of completing co-op hours. For participant Margaret Teasdale, Art Your Service has allowed her to try things she might not have previously attempted. Before she started taking a weekly painting class, she said, "I would have said I can't even draw a stick man." Teasdale appreciates the flexibility of the service, which provides live classes and access to a video library of past classes. She also enjoys live classes, which allow her to stay connected with friends from her seniors centre. "I could take classes on YouTube, but it's not the same thing. I don't know those people," she said. Art Your Service programs can be accessed through municipalities and seniors centres that buy group memberships, or through individual memberships, which cost $19.99 a month. - With files from Torstar News Service VIRTUAL SENIORS CENTRE OFFERS PAINTING, COOKING, MORE BUSINESS Margaret Teasdale "would have said I can't even draw a stick man" before she started taking weekly painting classes through Art Your Service, a business launched by Whitby resident Jen Tindall. Margaret Teasdale photo ART YOUR SERVICE Website: artyourservice.org Email: jen@artyourservice.org Phone: 416-500-3435 Facebook: facebook.com/ www.artyourservice.org ART YOUR SERVICE STARTED WITH 20 SENIORS AND HAS GROWN TO ABOUT 400 SUBSCRIBERS JILLIAN FOLLERT jfoller t@durhamregion.com