Lakeview doctor fighting COVID-19 gets good news: Husband tests negative for virus
You could almost hear the happiness in Dr. Michele Reed’s text as she shared the news on Friday.
“Scott’s result is negative,” she said.
Reed, a family physician with practices in Rosedale, Queens, and in Garden City, tested positive for COVID-19 on March 26. Reed spent more than two weeks quarantined in her bedroom away from her family in their Lakeview home.
Reed's health started to improve this week, but last weekend she started worrying about her husband, Scott Kershaw, when he began coughing and clearing his throat frequently. On Monday he went to be tested, and the two began praying that Scott wouldn't fall sick just as she was starting to feel better.
Friday morning they got the good news, and Scott says he could see the sense of relief in his wife’s face.
"It’s one thing to be sick, but the last thing you want is to pass it on to someone else,” Kershaw said. “I think that kind of weight, even though she wasn’t expressing it, was probably troubling. Because you immediately go from worrying about yourself to being a wife and worrying about protecting others.”
Reed, 51, her husband, and their twin 16-year-old sons, Stephen and Marcus Kershaw, agreed to share video, phone interviews and a video diary with Newsday to provide insight into the ordeal a front-line health care professional — and her family — go through when she is stricken with coronavirus.
On Tuesday morning, Reed was able stop isolating herself after going 72 hours without a fever without the use of Tylenol or any other fever-reducing medicine, which is in accordance with the guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Scott has long suffered from allergies and the couple believes that is what caused the symptoms he had been having.
Scott’s negative test means Reed will no longer require the family to wear masks around the house. They can finally eat a meal together, though they plan to continue to socially distance somewhat inside the house with everyone sleeping in a separate bedroom.
“Because we are a close-knit family, we want to reach out and we want to hug,” Reed said. “The moment you get within the personal space barrier, we have to remind ourselves.”
The couple is also excited that Reed and a couple members of her staff feel well enough that they are going to open their office on Monday. Though the office won’t be open for patients to come visit, they are going to have staff members begin reaching out to patients and setting up telemedicine calls with Reed.
“It’s basically a phone triage,” said Scott, a lawyer who also helps out with Reed’s practice.
Reed stressed that she is thankful for all the support her family has gotten from their friends throughout their ordeal. She had one friend help arrange a Zoom birthday party for her 16-year-old twins, including sending balloons. She had another friend, Vanessa Senior, repeatedly drop off a homemade herbal tea drink that really helped her with her dry cough and other symptoms.
Said Reed: “We really feel blessed.”
Barbara Barker is an award-winning columnist and features writer in the sports department at Newsday. She has covered sports in New York for more than 20 years.
