Meet a pair of Las Cruces health care workers on the front lines in NYC

LAS CRUCES, New Mexico -- ABC-7 continues to highlight health care workers who are working on the front lines helping Covid-19 patients.

ABC-7's New Mexico Mobile Newsroom spoke to two Las Cruces health care workers who are working at the epicenter of the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States: New York City.

Sean Doyle

At only 20-years-old, Sean Doyle didn't let his age discourage him from going to New York City. He told ABC-7 he wanted to go to help patients but also learn new skills and solidify his passion for medicine.

The Centennial High School graduate said he's working as a paramedic. He found out about the field hospital he's been working at for one month on Facebook.

"I’m an adrenaline junky so anything that I can go into, at a very fast pace environment, thats what I’ve always done," Doyle said. "When I went to school this is what I went to school for emergency medicine."

Doyle has been working 12-hour shifts helping patients get back on their feet and eventually discharged. His last day is Friday, May 8.

“I was scared and excited to be able to help make difference and help everyone else here," Doyle said. "Every single person that I’ve worked with here is extremely talented and so caring and compassionate. It's pretty amazing how..there was a call to help people and so many people just came out here and asked 'what can I do.” 

Shila Bardwell

Shila Bardwell is a nurse practitioner in Las Cruces. She said curiosity, her calling, and what she saw on the news that ultimately led her to make the decision to fly out to New York City.

"You kept hearing about there's not enough equipment, there's not enough nurses, there's not enough health care providers," Bardwell said. "If something happens like that and they have the skill set, they go."

Bardwell has been at the epicenter of the virus for four weeks, working as a nurse in the intensive care unit. She said two weeks ago,"it was chaos." Many patients coming into the ICU were being intubated and many more died. She said the first couple of weeks were "scary," but she's starting to see the curve flatten.

"It wasn’t what I thought," Bardwell said. "It's not just the older population that was sick. It was healthy, younger patients as well. It's definitely a serious virus and I think we need to take it as serious as we have been taking it.” 

Bardwell is expected to come back to Las Cruces in the next two weeks.