Macon native left GA to work in the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is his story.

In early March, Patrick Scoles left Georgia, the only state he had ever lived in, to follow his career as a travel nurse to the state of Washington at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Scoles, a Rutland High School and Middle Georgia State University alum, decided last year he wanted to leave Georgia.

He was finishing his contract at Piedmont Atlanta Hospital, the first position he accepted as a travel nurse. He eventually was assigned to Valley Medical Center in Renton, Washington about two hours away from where the first case of COVID-19 was reported in the United States.

“It was the first place I wanted to come because of the weather, the scenery, the golf and outdoor activities,” Scoles said. “When it (COVID-19 outbreak) happened I was like you know I can’t back out now… The reason I started traveling is that I wanted to find somewhere I eventually wanted to settle down.”

Scoles grew up in Macon and decided early on in life that he wanted to be a doctor. He had a dream of going to medical school. He started college at Valdosta State but his dad got sick and so he moved back to Macon. He decided then that he would go into nursing at Middle Georgia State University. At first, he struggled with the decision.

“I am one of the first in my family to graduate with any sort of degree. I kind of set the bar high. So it was kind of demoralizing a bit,” Scoles said. “Now that I see what I get to do and how I impact people every day, I don’t feel bad at all.”

Traveling to Washington

Earlier this year, he and his corgi Ollie piled into his car with all his belongings and headed to Washington over 2,500 miles away. The trip took the pair through major cities over the course of four days.

It was the first time Scoles really saw the impact of COVID-19: cities were like ghost towns.

“I went through all these large cities. I hit Salt Lake City, I hit Boise, I hit Seattle of course. And it is hard not to think about it because they were dead,” Scoles said. “It was really weird. It was really eerie… Seeing the ghost towns is when it sank in that this is real.”

When Scoles arrived in Washington, there were already nearly 1,000 cases of coronavirus in the state. Travel nurses typically receive one to two days of training rather than a full orientation: one day of training on the computer systems and then one day shadowing a nurse. Scoles said that travel nurse have to hit the ground running, whether there is a pandemic or not.

The challenging part of the transition has not been getting up to speed, but leaving behind his friends and family in Georgia. When Scoles traveled in Georgia, he was able to go home on the weekends. Now he is nearly 3,000 miles away with just Ollie to lean on.

“I never thought I would come to Washington much less live here or work here,” Scoles said. “I am so glad I got a dog before I did this... because it helps to come home and have something that is so happy to see you.”

Ollie’s impact was even more profound when Scoles became ill a few weeks into being at his new hospital. He tested negative for COVID-19 but had all the symptoms and believes he battled the coronavirus for about 18 days. Ollie stood beside Scoles the entire time making sure he was okay.

“He reads the mood. When I got sick, he laid and stared directly at me from two feet away and would not leave my side,” Scoles said.

Working at a hospital during the pandemic

Scoles’ hospital is currently split into four zones. Zone one is for minor injuries, zone two the dedicated COVID-19 unit, zone three and four are your regular patients.

In he first two weeks, Scoles lost over 15 pounds from the personal protective equipment (PPE) he had to wear during his 12-hour shifts in the COVID-19 unit.

Nurses no longer have to work their entire shift in that unit. Scoles said one of the toughest parts of the adjustment was the PPE causing indentations on his face and his ears to bleed from the mask rubbing.

“The adjustment stinks. There is no other word for it. The masks hurt, the N-95 that we have to wear. The other mask that we have to wear over it to protect it from blood and body fluids those pull on your ears,” Scoles said. “I have gotten off one shift and the backside of my ears were bleeding cause of how bad they rub. I have indentations in my face. I have continuous headaches because the masks press right against your sinuses.”

Finding a new home

Scoles motivation for becoming a travel nurse was to help him find a new place that he might want to live. Washington has already allowed him play one of his dream golf courses in Chambers Bay, the host of the 2015 U.S Open. He already has a couple of other places in mind on where he might travel next in California and Hawaii.

He is hoping to knock out a couple more of his dream golf courses along the way like Pebble Beach. But his new community in Washington has been incredibly supportive and makes it a potential place that he would like to stay in longer. Just at the hospital the community steps up and has food delivered to them sometimes two or three times a day.

“The outpouring of love here is incredible… Everybody up here has been incredibly nice,” Scoles said. “The reason I don’t want to leave is I live in a really nice area. I have perfect views. I live on the side of a mountain.”

Scoles hasn’t lost any patients to COVID-19, and he said that while he understands the risk of caring for individuals infected with the coronavirus, his patients’ lives are more important than his own.

Despite being across the country, he has still received support from his friends and family in Middle Georgia who have sent him care packages along with things to help make the PPE a bit more comfortable and help reduce the rubbing on his ears. The support from his hometown means a lot but he also doesn’t believe that what he is doing is any different from the nurses in Georgia.

“I am just doing what I love to do. I am very blessed like what I do as a job,” Scoles said. “I am blessed to work with the people up here that I work with… We are all doing the same thing. We are all fighting the same battle. We are all on the same team.”