Welcome to Nobody Told Me.

I'm Laura Owens, and I'm Jan Black.

Unfortunately, COVID-19 has forced the world to think about death and dying in ways most of us never imagined.

And joining us on this episode is Dr. Lydia Dugdale, who's been treating COVID-19 patients in New York City.

She's an associate professor of medicine and director of the Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at Columbia University.

And Dr. Dugdale is a specialist in end-of-life issues and the author

of the new book, The Lost Art of Dying. Dr. We thank you so much for joining us. It's my pleasure.

Thanks for having me. You've worked with patients facing death in many circumstances over the years.

And I'm wondering, in what ways has this pandemic been different

in terms of the end-of-life issues it's raised? Oh, wow. It's certainly been different in many ways.

Starting with the sheer volume of COVID patients that we had come into the emergency room and into the hospital

in mid-March to mid-April. It was really overwhelming. And as so many of your listeners know,

by the time the pandemic really started leaving an impact in New York City, we were having to

limit visitors to the hospital in order to try to curb the spread of virus.

But what this meant is that we had so many patients who were dying in the hospital and unable to see their families.

And this was devastating for staff, for clinicians, and for patients and their families.

And while we did the best that we could to facilitate conversations through FaceTime and other media,

unfortunately, the sheer circumstances just made it so difficult to say goodbye in person. That policy was modified in subsequent days

at so many hospitals to let family members in their, you know, in their last hours as patients

were dying. But it was difficult. It was really difficult. And I would say another aspect that

was different with the pandemic has been that people

who never thought that they would be dying were suddenly in the hospital with life-threatening

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