The BulleTin • Wednesday, OcTOBer 13, 2021 A3
LOCAL, STATE & REGION
Overwhelmed by pandemic, health care
workers turn to the hospital chaplains
BY BRYCE DOLE
east Oregonian
P
ENDLETON — The pa-
tient had been fighting
in the intensive care unit
for weeks, and the nurse had
grown attached.
He was younger than most
COVID-19 patients admitted
to CHI St. Anthony Hospital
in Pendleton. It was August,
and the delta variant was rag-
ing through Oregon, filling
hospitals with patients and ex-
hausting health care workers.
A record number of Uma-
tilla County residents who
contracted the virus died that
month. He was one of them.
Ann Marie Hardin, a hos-
pital chaplain, was called in to
help with the next steps, tell-
ing the family and the funeral
home. She turned a corner
and saw the nurse, who burst
into tears and fell into Hardin’s
arms.
“She felt that it was such a
waste,” Hardin said. “The pa-
tient was young. Had the pa-
tient been vaccinated, there
potentially could have been
a different outcome. And
that was really hard to pro-
cess for her. She felt that it
shouldn’t have had to happen.
He shouldn’t have had to die.
And she looked to me as a safe
place to lay some of that sad-
ness.”
Hardin did what she has
done throughout the pan-
demic — she listened. The
nurse vented to Hardin about
things she knew few would
understand but her.
“We had a conversation
about how hard this was for
her because she had gotten
attached to the patient,” said
then it’s going to get better,’”
she said. “It’s an acknowledg-
ment that we’re just working
through this and doing the
best we can do, one patient at
a time, one day at a time.”
She called her job a privi-
lege, but one that comes with
responsibility.
“The notion of saying
something wrong and making
something worse is terrifying,”
she said. “But it is an incred-
ible privilege to help bring a
bit of balance and healing into
their life.”
She joined the hospital as
an on-call chaplain in 2019. A
math teacher at Blue Moun-
tain Community College, she
felt compelled to help health
care workers through their
day-to-day work while hear-
ing stories from her husband,
an emergency department
nurse at St. Anthony. Now, she
works evenings and weekends.
“I’m not somebody who
likes to be bored,” she said.
Throughout the pandemic,
Ben lonergan/east Oregonian she has stood by as infection
Ann Marie Hardin, a hospital chaplain, poses for a portrait Friday in the has ebbed and flowed. She has
listened to health care workers
chapel at St. Anthony Hospital in Pendleton.
whose patients improve and
Hardin. “And I was reminded
derstand on at least a level
decline over weeks of treat-
that I do this job to try to help what they’re dealing with and
ment, and always in isolation,
our nurses through these hard what they’re going through,”
away from their families.
moments.”
Hardin said. “Because we’re
She told of a nurse whose
As one of St. Anthony’s
there, and we see it.”
patient had to go on comfort
three chaplains, Hardin’s job
She listens in the hallways
care, a stage where a nurse
is to walk around the hospital
and at the nurses stations as
helps soothe a patient at the
and talk to health care work-
the staff relate the stress of
end of life. The nurse had
ers, helping them find solace
their jobs. She said health care given the last dose of medica-
and make sense of what they
workers can often be reluctant tion, and she came to Hardin
witness. It’s a job several health to seek help themselves, so she struggling to cope.
care workers say has become
enjoys finding them and giv-
“She had almost felt like
especially critical as they en-
ing them an opportunity to
she had killed the patient,” she
dure the pandemic’s toll.
talk, even if all they utter are
said. “So I suggested to her
“I do think chaplains are
sarcastic remarks:
that, rather than think of it
some of the only people that
“I had one girl tell me, ‘It’s
that way, she should think of it
nurses can talk to who do un-
going to suck for a while, and
as giving the gift of a peaceful
passing.”
And over the past two
months, the staff have only
grown more tired and anx-
ious, she said.
“The energy level has
dropped,” she said. “People are
tired. They’re feeling stressed,
and there’s a lot of worry right
now because of impending
staff losses and no impending
decrease in patients.”
The hospital, already short
staffed, could lose many of its
workers in the coming weeks
when the state’s vaccine man-
date goes into effect, forcing
health care workers to get the
shot or lose their jobs. That
impending reality has sown a
new kind of division, Hardin
said, between unvaccinated
employees worried about find-
ing new work and vaccinated
employees fearing what work
will be like without them.
The mandate comes as
Umatilla County reported
weekly case counts exceeding
350 for the 11th straight week,
making the delta crisis the
largest the county has faced by
far. And a recent spike, driven
partly by an outbreak linked
to the Pendleton Round-Up,
means the hospital could see
yet another surge in patients.
“There’s some uncertainty,
which leads to worry and con-
cern,” Hardin said.
But for Hardin, she knows
there’s only one thing a chap-
lain can do.
“We try to pass it on to
God,” she said. “We’re chap-
lains. We try to pass those
things on along to that higher
power that can maybe do
something, or at least take that
burden so that we don’t have
to carry it.”
Looking for Today in History?
It now publishes inside with
Dear Abby and Horoscope.
Oregonians
will get 17%
of their 2020
state income
taxes back
BY BETSY HAMMOND
The Oregonian
Oregonians will get 17%
of their 2020 Oregon in-
come taxes back as a kicker
credit when they file their
2021 taxes next year, the Or-
egon Department of Reve-
nue announced Tuesday.
Revenue officials deter-
mined more than a month
ago that Oregon’s unique
kicker rebate law would gen-
erate a jaw-dropping $1.9
billion. But they needed to
finalize and certify exactly
how much each tax filer
would be entitled to.
The official answer is
17.341% of 2020 state in-
come taxes paid. Taxpay-
ers can find their 2020 tax
liability on line 22 of their
2020 Form OR.
Oregonians get a kicker
rebate when the state’s reve-
nue exceeds by 2% or more
what state forecasters pro-
jected far ahead of time. No
other state has a similar law.
People who paid 2020 Or-
egon income taxes can file
for and receive the credit in
2022, even if they don’t owe
Oregon taxes on their 2021
income.
If you owe the state
money, whether for back
taxes or for other items such
as court fines or child sup-
port, however, the state may
use all or part of your kicker
that debt first.