COVID-19 is sweeping the world. Worldwide, there are more than 1.2 million cases and counting. More than 70,000 have died, as of April 6. This pandemic has done many things — it has shown people loving on each other from afar. Stories abound of people in urban areas standing outside at least six feet apart singing songs and of neighorhoods having “social distancing parties” where everyone sits in their own driveway waving and talking to each other across streets and property lines. It’s shown us the value of technology; where would we be without FaceTime, Zoom and Microsoft Teams right now? My church — and countless others — livestream services to an empty sanctuary Sunday mornings and we congregate virtually.

But, as extreme events often do, it’s shown shortcomings. It’s shown shortcomings in selfish people who hoard necessities and leave others without household goods, food and even diapers and baby formula. It’s also brought to light an overwhelmed medical system.

Notably, hospital beds per 1,000 people are low. Japan leads the world, with 13.1 beds per 1,000 people. The U.S. lags far behind with only 2.8, according to Peterson-KFF’s Health System Tracker. (Italy, which is struggling so severely with capacity and has a remarkably high death rate from COVID-19, has 3.2 beds per 1,000.) Medical supplies also are in short supply, in particular ventilators to help patients breathe and personal protective equipment for healthcare workers.

Most medical systems are canceling what they call “elective” surgeries and governments even issued mandates that all elective procedures be delayed. By definition, elective procedures are those that are not life-sustaining, preserve the life of a limb or organ or that delay the metastasis of cancer. Orthopedic procedures fall under this definition.

A 15-Year Journey

As most people know, I’m in the middle of a complicated hip journey. I don’t recall when they started causing problems, but I believe it was sometime in college.

It took several years for me to finally call a doctor about it, but finally did so shortly after moving to the Chicago area after college graduation. It’s been 15 years since that first appointment with an orthopedist who said, “You don’t need a hip replacement” and sent me on my way. I didn’t puruse it much after that, but the cracking, catching and discomfort escalated each year. I finally went back to a hip specialist in 2015 after a horse fall prompted me to seek medical attention. An MRI revealed not only a small fracture from the fall, but also anatomical abnormalities that explained my long-standing hip problems.

It took years to find that Ohio doctor who believed I could have hip pain at such a young age. It then took years to get through the first three hip surgeries, which as I now know, merely treated the symptoms of a much bigger problem. Now I’m in the middle of finally treating the femoral retroversion in both legs that’s causing hip problems.

Today, I’m 5 months post-op from my right femoral osteotomy, where I let a surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic cut my right femur in half, twist it and use a plate and screws to hold it together. Anthem BCBS of Virginia denied the second part of what the surgeon wanted to do that day: a hip scope to fix damage in the joint.

The surgeon, who I hold in very high regard, believed there was a chance that the osteotomy alone would make me pain-free and repositioning the bone would make me asymptomatic. Within a month of the osteotomy, however, it was glaringly obvious I needed the scope to fix damage to the joint itself.

The follow up scope was finally approved and scheduled for April 7. But in mid-March, the Ohio governor issued a mandate that, in light of COVID-19, hospitals forego elective surgeries. Days later, the surgeon contacted me with a tentative new date: July 7. Three whole months after the originally scheduled procedure, and eight months beyond when I had my osteotomy and the scope should have been performed in the first place.

I’m not able to walk because of sharp pain in the joint; it feels someone is stabbing me with shards of glass. I struggle to sleep because of pain. Because it’s my right leg, I can’t drive. I can’t even care for our own child properly. Please don’t tell me this surgery is “elective.” Don’t tell me walking is elective, sleeping is elective and certainly don’t tell me that being a mother is elective.

Be Kind

I’m a member of several hip-related social media groups. We all understand the necessity to cancel our surgeries to free up valuable resources for life-and-death situations. We’re all concerned about the severity of this pandemic and want to see it brought under control. We want to see people remain healthy and, for those who get sick, we want to see them heal and go on to live full lives. We understand that means our surgeries need to be canceled to free up the many sets of PPE doctors and nurses wear in the operating rooms and to free up the ventilators we use while under general anesthesia.

But that doesn’t mean we all aren’t crushed by our orthopedic situations. That doesn’t mean I’m not mourning the loss of my much-needed surgery date and that I’m not frustrated by the longer wait while my hip continues to deterioriate.

Elective surgeries are not always unnecessary. To me, this isn’t the least bit elective. It is necessary and vital to my physical health, mental health and being.

Social media is a tough place to be right now. On the one hand, I see most relevant headlines first on social media. On the other hand, I also see posts from people complaining how hard it is to not attend a fitness class or how they had to miss a concert. I miss those things, too.

But please understand at the end of COVID-19, as most people return to their ways of life immediately, there’s a whole population of us “elective” surgery patients who will still feel the very real effects of this pandemic. The end of the pandemic doesn’t mean we’ll have our surgeries the next day, the next week or even the next month. The end of the pandemic doesn’t mean the end of our pain. For many, this pandemic is lengthening already long and painful journey. Already damaged joints are incurring even more damage as we wait even longer for very necessary surgical intervention.

Be gentle with those of us who are elective surgical casualties of the coronavirus. Just because our surgery doesn’t determine if our heart keeps beating or not doesn’t mean it’s not very necessary.