BOSTON – Myron Rolle – or one of his colleagues – picks up the phone and begins dialing. On the other end, their patients are about to get some bad news.
Procedures on their benign brain tumor need to be put on hold.
Treatment for their chronic degenerative spine that’s causing radiculopathy has to wait.
Their elective neurological surgeries have been postponed or canceled, forced to take a backseat for the time being as Massachusetts General Hospital deals with the rapid influx of coronavirus patients.
There’s no alternative. Rolle, a former Tennessee Titans safety who is now a third-year neurosurgery resident at Massachusetts General and Harvard Medical School, has seen the neurosurgery floor of his hospital transition to a COVID-19-only floor.