Annual Pub 2022 - Flipbook - Page 6
Helpless No More
by Paul Harasim
In her mind’s eye, Dr. Evelyn Montalvo Stanton still can see what she 昀椀rst saw during
her last year of undergraduate school – a
child lying badly injured on a Jersey City
Street.
“I felt so helpless,” says the pediatrician who
is the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at
UNLV Chair of Pediatrics. “The child was hit
by a car while crossing the street. I called
9-1-1, went to the hospital, but I wondered
what I could have done differently to help.”
Forty years have passed since that tragic
day in Jersey City – a day that spurred a
young woman on to graduate from Rutgers
New Jersey Medical School and then into a
pediatric residency and to a research fellowDR. EVELYN MONTAVO STANTON | PHOTO: WADE VANDERVORT/VEGAS INC.
ship in pediatric pulmonology at Columbia
University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Ivy League school where she also would teach.
Since then, Dr. Montalvo Stanton has devoted her professional life to working with children, becoming nationally
recognized for her commitment to youngsters with breathing problems. When she came upon a scene similar to
what she saw 40 years ago, she was able to stabilize a child with a broken leg, instead of just being able to dial
9-1-1.
Helpless? That feeling was buried deep in her psyche – until late 2020. That’s when COVID-19 hit her family and
made her sicker than she’s ever been in her life. “Remember, there were no vaccines then for the public, no monoclonal antibodies for treatment,” she says.
Still, she and her family – her elderly parents live with her and her attorney husband – had followed the best medical advice. They wore masks, practiced social distancing, washed their hands repeatedly, used sanitizers. Dr.
Montalvo Stanton made sure to change her clothes, and throw them in the wash, once she got home from working
with patients.
“My family and I did not go out socializing,” she recalls. “We did go out to go food shopping. We still don’t know how
we got it and never will.”
While the virus did not make a particularly dramatic entrance into her home, Dr. Montalvo Stanton realized something was off kilter: “I remember my brother calling our mother and she didn’t recognize his voice. I thought that
was odd. She appeared tired, but had no fever. I also saw my step dad sleep more than usual. I said to my husband,
‘I hope they don’t have COVID.’ I started to monitor their vitals, examine them and check their oxygen levels. I said
to my husband, ‘We need to get tested.’ We were able to get tested and sure enough we were all positive. I was
devastated, thinking the worst. Since my parents were seniors with underlying medical conditions, my heart was
aching and I prayed to God to keep us out of the hospital. I felt so helpless. I was so afraid of lung disease for my
parents, that they’d end up on a ventilator. There was nothing I could really do for my family and I’m a doctor. No
antibiotics. Really nothing. Rest was the key, hydration, lots of lemon and honey and prayer.”
Dr. Montalvo Stanton’s colleagues were as shocked as she was that she came down with the virus. “I was always
following all the rules with wearing an N-95 mask and hand-washing and social distancing. People at work were
always telling me over the phone that if it could get it, anybody could.”
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KIRK KERKORIAN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AT UNLV
SUMMER 2022
