Loneliness, fear and anger - my personal journey through Sars

Nurse Leung Siu-hong, who caught Sars while treating other sufferers, recounts an ordeal tinged with both bitterness and hope

When I was sick, my wife brought food for me every day and handed it to the nurses. Because she couldn't see me, she stood in the parking lot with binoculars and looked up at me while I stood in the window. I couldn't see her face but at least I could see her.

I am supposed to go back to work in two weeks if my checkup shows I am fit enough to do so. At the moment my mobility is only 60 per cent of what it used to be. My heart beats rapidly and it hurts when I take a shower or eat.

I don't want to go out because I'm embarrassed about how I look. The treatment has caused many side effects. The steroids gave me acne and all my muscles have deteriorated, leaving my arms and legs as thin as sticks. I tried to exercise a bit in the hospital and tried jumping a little. But my legs collapsed underneath me because I had lost all my strength. The Ribavirin must have made my immune system weak, causing me to catch shingles.

My nose looks like it's rotten ... all raw and inflamed. I have to go for a checkup in two weeks to see if I have permanent lung damage. A colleague from the intensive-care unit (ICU) who also got Sars said parts of his lungs had gone through fibrosis. It is so unfair that he will have to suffer when he gets older.

Before I fell sick, I had been undergoing some training and returned to work at Princess Margaret Hospital's ICU at the most chaotic time of the outbreak. Usually we have one staff member per patient but during that time we had to look after five patients each. The management said we had to take every Sars patient. There was insufficient staff and resources. Some of the wards didn't even have ventilation fans installed.