Joseph Kras: At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, you got really, really mad at me, that I kept going into work, to hospice and palliative care. 

Sophie Kras: I was mad at you because I felt like you were choosing your work over your family, and me. Whenever you talked about your duty as a physician my mind would just turn that around as, what about your duty as a father? You could save them, but you could end up killing me.

JK: If I should infect somebody in my own family and they should die or get very sick, of course I’d be guilty forever about that. How do you balance other duties that you have in your life, including of course to your own family? And, so, here’s the thing. If I don’t do it, who is going to? Is everybody gonna step back and not do it? Would I want other physicians to turn their back on you if you were sick? Absolutely not. 

SK: So, I’ve always wondered, how do you talk to patients who are dying, but yet they want to live?

JK: You know, they are owed honesty above all else, and so I give them that, but, people need to know that you’re going to walk the path with them, whatever that path may be.

I had this one patient–her long standing partner was not allowed to come into the hospital, and she was getting near the end of life. And the last time that this person was going to be talking before she decided to go on the ventilator was to us, and not to her partner. There was just the sense of aloneness that was over the room. And me trying to be present because sometimes that’s the most and the least that you can do for your patients. But sometimes, you know, that’s, that’s not enough. I, I think if you’re a good doctor, um, a lot of your patients take a little, take a little chunk out of you, every now and then.

SK: If I think about it harder, which I’ve had a lot of time to do since school stopped, I realize that being a physician is hard, and even though I don’t really tell you, I really admire that you go out there and confront these contagious diseases and people who are dying, and people who are angry and sad. 

JK: There’s things sometimes you can’t change, and you just do your best. But, I gotta say one of the things I miss most is giving you a hug. And uh, when this is all over it’s uh, one of the things I wanna do.