S6 EP9: Dr Qureshi's Story - COVID Frontline Trauma & Identity Reckoning

As a Doctor, working in multiple hospitals on the front lines during COVID, Dr Furhan Qureshi witnessed prolonged exposure to death, distrust in medicine, and moral injury inside overwhelmed systems. His story shows what repeated crisis does to a physician’s identity, faith in systems, and personal resilience. 

To add, Dr Q was going through a tough divorce art the exact time Covid hit. He was traumatized. 

Dr Q also shares some expose of what really happened behind the scenes during the hardest ties of the Covid Pandemic.

Buckle up!

Links:

Business IG : @nooresthetiquewc

Personal IG: @furhanqureshiMD

www.glowwithnoor.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:31

Welcome to another episode of Well, that fucked me up. I am your host, Luke. I know. I'm your host, Luke Colson. And today we're joined by Furhan Kureshi. Did I get that right?

SPEAKER_01 1:43

Yep, Dr. Furhan Kureshi, you are correct.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

I forgot the doctor. That's super important.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Um or major or major. Depends if you're on the military say I'm also that. I'm also an officer of the Air Force. So there's also that.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

Okay. Okay, major. Copy. 10-4. Um every week we have a guest who comes on and talks to us about surviving life-changing events and experiences. And um, it can be about anything from your past to present, emotional, physical, um, a a lifelong experience, a one-off event. Um, so Varhan, with that, where would you like to begin?

SPEAKER_01 2:23

Life-changing event. There are so many of those. I guess the goal is to discuss adversity, right?

SPEAKER_00 2:32

Yeah, I think the goal is to discuss adversity, and I know that you have seen some shit in your time um doing what you do. And I think what would be important would be to understand those effects that that that had on you and your journey through that. I think that would be a really good topic for us to chat about.

SPEAKER_01 2:50

Well, you know what? If we're gonna talk about adversity, I I don't think there's there's anything better than uh than COVID. That was quite the struggle for me.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Oh God, I can't even imagine. So you were in hospital on the front lines? Yes, I was. My goodness. And whereabouts were you when that happened? And let's have a chat about that, if you don't mind going back to that fucking horrendous time that ruined us all.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

Well, that was that was quite the journey. Um right when COVID started, so did my first, so did my divorce. And it all happened at the same time the perfect storm. Um yeah, it it was it was it was a lot. So where was I? I live in Northern Virginia. In those days, I was working one week on, one week off over in Pennsylvania on the border with uh West Virginia, Maryland, and and that kind of panhandle. So I was over in Chambersburg, and and I remember that um as COVID had just started, unfortunately, my first marriage was falling apart. And um ultimately we were kind of uh headed down, and uh I just I you know uh I was trying, I I remember, you know, I made those classic mistakes that every every hard worker kind of makes. We we we think if we work harder, we earn more money and we buy more gifts, we can we can buy our our love.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

Buy our love and buy our happiness.

SPEAKER_01 4:33

Yeah, and um what's that song? You can't buy my love. Yeah, I I I couldn't I couldn't do that with the first one.

SPEAKER_00 4:41

And did you have did you have kids? I hope that's not too amazing.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

No, no, no, not not with the first one, thank god. Yeah, that would have been horrible. Yeah, so you know it it was terrible because COVID uh had had just just begun. Uh we had started seeing our first few cases. It was a very mysterious disease because we didn't know anything about it. It was almost like an alien invasion coming in. Um, we don't know anything about it. And that and I and I I was it was the was the first one in that hospital to admit the first COVID case. Oh my god. It was a gentleman in his in his uh late 40s, he was an asthmatic. He came in otherwise healthy, just asthmatic, fully on BIPAP. He couldn't breathe. And uh they had just the the he had just been positive for that State Department, you know, test, and uh and and he looks at me with horror. He's like, am I gonna make it? And I was like, I I honestly don't know. Um but but I'll I'll tell you what, I'm gonna be right with you this this entire night because I was doing nights. I'm gonna be too this entire night help helping you fight through this. And and I held his hand, and um, you know, that's when both my divorces starting and going my marriage is going down, and then and then my my uphill battle against this horrible disease started. Yeah, and uh every every week, every month they got worse. In those days, I was moonlighting between Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Tennessee. Um, and it was just horrible what happened, man. I mean, um, a lot of the doctors, especially the older ones, they were all like, you know, was suddenly like retiring early. I'm like, wait a second, Dr. You know, so-and-so is only 58 years old. He's retiring. Okay, sure. Yeah, it was a bad time. We we we got to see who who you know who the real ones were. The question became who are who are the real ones?

SPEAKER_00 6:45

People literally like, I'm I'm out, I'm out of the shit. Time out. Absolutely, absolutely, bro.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

It was so bad. Like, and you know, I don't want to put anybody's profession down, but I felt like the higher the specialty in terms of pay and prestige, like cardiology, especially. I'm I'm I'm comfortable calling them out. A lot of those guys were were cowards. Uh uh, I I don't mind calling them out. They were refusing to do cardiac categorization. People be like, Oh, he he's fine. Uh, we can see him in a month. Like, what well, why do you want to see him in a month? He he has these indications on his EKG. Why can't we do it now? Oh uh well, you know, he's good, but no, he's not good. That's why I'm calling you. Oh, is it because he's covet positive? Is that why? I mean, there was some serious cowardice going on in the hospital. Yeah, I'm not gonna name which one because I don't want to go through, but in general, it was happening everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 7:38

That's unbelievable. That is absolutely shocking. Because, but I guess I mean I'm not saying that's the right thing to do, not in a million years, but people were freaking out, weren't they? Because we there was a point where we didn't have to.

SPEAKER_01 7:50

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm gonna stop you. No, no, no. We took it, we took an oath. We took an oath when we finished med school, we took a Hippocratic oath.

SPEAKER_00 7:57

Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_01 7:58

We are we're supposed to, you know, as a physician, you know, your your your duty is to the patient, yeah. Of course, it's not it's not to protect my 401k, my expensive cars, my girlfriends. It's it's not for those those worldly pleasures. Cool. You took an oath to protect those people. Wow, and and and I'm sure some of some cardiologists will get pissed and claim, well, I fought for my patients, and that's fine. Maybe he did. But in my experience, a lot of cardiologists were playing these stupid games. The procedural is for all doing this. The cardiologists, the GI doctors were doing this thing, they wouldn't scope anybody uh for bleeds because they claimed, oh, he looks good to me when really they were COVID positive and they're pushing off these cases. And you know, I mean, did some people suffer? Maybe I I personally didn't find anybody who directly had a mortality alchemy. If I did, I would have reported them. Yeah, but I reported I reported some physicians. I remember in Virginia, uh, there was there were a few quack doctors who were writing ivermectin for people, which this is like what? This is now like like uh year like let's see, 2020, this thing started. We're talking like late 2021 or early 2022. At that point, there's evidence that ivermectin wasn't working. There was there were still some quack doctors out there who were writing it. I remember I had one Marine, uh, it was a Marine patient of mine. You know, it was so sad what happened. You know, we're we're talking, we're talking. I I was working in Fredericksburg at the time. Uh, you know, he was a Marine, he was a former Marine, the late 30s, he had a very strong Roman god type body. He showed these pictures. Yeah, he looked he looked bad. He was completely cacactic, muscle wasted. It looked like he was starving for a month because the the COVID ate out his his muscle. And I'm just like, oh my god, like who's your what happened? He's like, Yeah, man, my doctor ordered me ivermectin. Like, he did? Why? You know, I told him I wasn't comfortable with the vaccine, so he said, Yeah, just take ivermectin instead. Like, yeah, he was using ivermectin as a prophylactic, as like a preventative. He's like, Yeah, like what's your doctor's name? Uh what's his website? Is this his website? And I remember I reported that that that quack to the Virginian Medical Board.

SPEAKER_00 10:14

Can I ask a question? Do doctors prescribe medication because they get money from the prescriptions they prescribe? Like, what is the purpose of somebody prescribing something that they know doesn't work?

SPEAKER_01 10:25

Good question. So your question is if I write a script, do I get money back like a commission? The answer is absolutely not. That's against the law.

SPEAKER_00 10:33

Right. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Um, yeah, that's against the law because you're you're you now have a you now have an inappropriate uh relationship where you are not prescribing for direct income. Now, does that mean there can't be anything shady? There's shady things all the time, man. We we see these cases. The FBI routinely every few months busts somebody because there's like there's a kickback. Yeah, but what some of the unscrupulous people do is okay, they don't give you cash, but they give you gifts. They give you a cruise, an educational cruise for you and your wife, and really you wrote X amount of uh of their drugs, like they give indirect kickbacks, which which are severely sh sh shunned upon, and and yeah, and you can get in trouble. So so that happens.

SPEAKER_00 11:19

Yeah, well, yeah. I I mean I listen, I'm from the UK originally. I live in LA, so I've been in the US for 11 years. And the one thing that's yeah, I love it here, strangely, and my kids don't know anything else, you know. But the one thing that's always been a real struggle for me is the American healthcare system. It feels like it's run-on profit, right? And then that's problematic for me because I don't trust necessarily doctors' reasons for prescribing me what they do or telling me to do a CAT scan or you know, a CT scan or an MRI. And then I see the bill that the insurance company's paying, and it's$27,000 for a scan, and I'm like, I didn't need that scan, but somebody somewhere is making a lot of money, you know.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

Well, about the bill, I can assure you he is probably not getting commission for ordering the MRI because that's against the law.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 12:15

Trust me, brother. Very good to know. If I got 10% off everything, you know, everybody. Exactly. All the every cold will need a facial CT scan, an MRI, uh, a long CT with contrast to really make sure.

SPEAKER_00 12:33

Oh my god. That's what it feels like sometimes. But good to know, good to know, actually.

SPEAKER_01 12:38

Yeah, yeah. No, but but unfortunately, we we're in a highly, highly defensive, like uh you know, world where the doctors in the US overorder things just to prove it's not something to prevent a lawsuit. And um it it it it's it's such a problem because lawsuits are very ugly in the US. And um I had the misfortune of being involved in one when I did nothing wrong, and I realized the case is extremely weak. So I asked some of my lawyer friends, like, why the hell would this lawyer you know sue me for this when the case is weak? And my lawyer friends told me flat, I was like, dude, he doesn't want to win. Like, well, what did why did he do it? He's like, bro, it's about the settlement, baby. What did my lawyer friends said to me? We don't want to win, it's about the settlement, baby. Like, really? So he's looking for a settlement. And um, you know, luckily we hold we held firm and he backed off because he realized the hospital wasn't gonna pay him, the group wasn't gonna pay him, I wasn't gonna pay him. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 13:36

Nobody was gonna pay him. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

We were we were we were we were full blown, uh, ready to not to not you know pay anybody and and uh be be done with it. So that's kind of where we were. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 13:48

Um so let's go back to the COVID of it all. How quickly did that escalate and and what sort of stuff did you have to see? And what happened to sort of stuff did you have to go through? And did you were you traumatized from that stuff that you went through? It must have been pretty pretty full on.

SPEAKER_01 14:06

You know, it was a very dark time because you you forgot to mention my divorce was happening at the same time as well.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

And by the way, I'm a divorcee, and the divorce for me uh nearly killed me. I was uh an alcoholic at the time. I was an alcoholic all of my life, and thankfully now I'm seven years sober. Um, but I got divorced eight years ago, which will tell you something about the reasoning behind my divorce, my drinking. We had kids that were in the middle of it as well. That's the worst part and I'm that's why I lost you, you know. Um and I honestly, with my alcoholism and where I was mentally, my father died that exact year. Oh, I was close to the I would say I was close to the end, is how dark it was in my world, right? And I'm here now and I'm better than ever, and I've risen above all of that, and I've managed to sort my life out and get myself sober. Kids are in my life and so on and so forth. But like I understand the darkness of divorce, and then put that in a world where you're on the front line during the only mass pandemic epidemic pandemic we've ever had must have been horrific.

SPEAKER_01 15:13

I saw so much death and suffering uh uh uh uh at the hospital. Um and and and mind you, I don't I don't I don't know how how expensive divorces are in the UK, but they're very expensive in the US, and it was just devastating. I remember I was working, you know, I was making a lot of money because now the doctors went short, the hospitals got desperate, they were paying us more money to keep working. I was working nights and I was working in the ICU, so I saw the worst perpetually, and I saw so much suffering. Yeah, there were several times during the that pandemic where people may not remember it, but I'll remind them the ICUs were full. So we had to sometimes have people on a BIPAP when they should have been uh intubated. And the BIPAP is is out of juice, it's out of power because the people are too sick, they have to be ventilated. The bipap only, you know, the pot that master keyword that blows air in only had so much power that I remember people's chests were hyperinflating, they were unresponsive, they were already goners. And and to and to make the trauma worse, we we had to we we were playing God sometimes. I remember one hospital in Tennessee I was working at. Um you know, you know, when people are about to die, we we we called a hospital, we called a palliative care team, and we can we call inpatient hospice, they come in and help ease these people down. I I remember one time, and mind you, this is a small town hospital. I used to call those guys like once once a week or once a month, you know, once every two weeks for the elderly lady who was dying of cancer, you know, stuff like that. One day I called them 17 times in one day.

SPEAKER_00 16:58

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

And yeah, and you know what was psychotic? My hours were 7A to 7p, right? Uh I was there from 7 a. to 1 a.m. the next morning continuously.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

And the CEO called me at midnight. He goes, Dr. Christian, I'm sorry to bother you. Did you call the hospice people 17 times today? And I apologize to see, I'm so sorry, man. There's like two more people who are gonna pass away, but it's 1 a.m. I've been working since 7 a.m. You know, yesterday now. Uh I'm sorry, I I I'm gonna call them tomorrow. Please don't be upset with me. Like, no, I'm not upset with you, but you really called hospice 17 times today? You know, Dr. Q, we only called them two to three times a month. You did 17 times in one day. Wow. I said, Yeah, I did that. There was that much death.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

Oh my god, how do you cope with that? How do you deal with that?

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Well, I'll have to be honest. My methods were not appropriate. Some people do alcohol, right? Some people do alcohol, yeah, some people do drugs. Um I didn't I didn't get into alcohol because I knew that would be that would be devastating. But when you're when you're having so much suffering, uh seeing so much suffering and then feeling so much suffering, you know, I'm going through my divorce, my self-esteem is low. Yeah, I mean, I tried to do healthy things like exercise, which which I did, and I and I lost weight, so that was good. Yeah, what was bad was I was at the same time having low self-esteem from the divorce. Like you didn't want to go through divorce, you get a revenge body. Yeah, I want I want to I'm gonna look good. So you're working hard, you're eating right, you get this beautiful body. So I got that while I'm suffering, and then I went through a bad boy phase. I pretty much I remember at one point I dated the entire fall catalog of the Hooters calendar. I I have a bad like I dated from Miss August through Mr. through Mrs. Sever. I dated all of them.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

That's how you that's how you started to deal with stuff.

SPEAKER_01 18:54

That's how I started, I started to deal with it that way, which was not appropriate.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

And um, you know, very honest, but also I I understand like talking about low self-esteem, talking about addictive personality over here, talking about divorce, talking about the things we do. You know, mine was exercise. I got into exercise in a major way, and I got fit and healthy when I decided to sort my life out, you know. But the sleeping around is another thing. It's like all the dating, it's another thing. You just you have to you sometimes have to trigger something in your brain to take your mind off the thing that's causing you all the all the the pain.

SPEAKER_01 19:31

Correct. Exactly, because you know, we when you're so devoid of something, you start seeking pleasure. So when you're suffering so much, it's like you're so thirsty, you want to have a taste of water. So, you know, I good things I did were like I said, I worked out my body was good, but then bad things, I I think I got way too in the uh you know, dating calendar girls, bad boy kind of kind of thing, uh, which was not you know great to do. I mean, it felt great at the time, but it wasn't hold on.

SPEAKER_00 20:01

Was this was this while COVID was happening? It's not it's not the easiest to be doing multi-dating during COVID.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Multi-dating while you're covered.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

I know that's uh sounds like a novel, that sounds like a book.

SPEAKER_01 20:15

Uh exactly, but and you know, it's it's like you could you could like at that point you don't even know what the other girl looks like. You're like uh you're like, you know, I I I can still see her pretty eyes behind that mask. Maybe this is how they date in the Middle East, man. Maybe this is how they date. I don't know. I know, but but but you know, uh there was that, and then you know, uh as we got towards 2022, COVID began coming down, the vaccine comes out, you know, we start going, we start going out more. Um at that point, uh, you know, my divorce is finalizing, you know, uh um things finally, you know, like like the divorce began in 2020. That's when COVID began. By late 2021, we had we we had we had we had agreed to our settlement that was being processed. By 2022, COVID was on its way out. You know, we we had the vaccines by then. Um so you know, I I did a lot of more self-healing. I I I traveled, I visited friends, um, you know, and eventually I you know found my current wife uh uh at the at the tail end of that. And um, you know, we we we stabilized. But um, you know, one one thing I I'm sure you felt the same way. When you're in your darkest of moments, when you're in the most darkest of the dark, that's when you know who your real friends are. Oh yeah. And and and and and that which is which is light, like your true friends, your true family, they they shine brightest, and and it's easier to see who your real friends are and and and who you're who who you're who the fakers are.

SPEAKER_00 21:55

That is correct.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

Uh I mean, you know, you you just don't know when things are good. Like one of my friends told me from my military, he he's very wise. He says to me, you know, major, you have to understand this is actually a good thing you're going through. I'm like, really? Why do you say that? He's like, Well, because when things are good, right? Everything is good, everybody's good. Even you know, the the fakers, the charlatans, they're good too. But when things are bad, you'll know who your real friends are, who really cares for you. Yeah, they will they will stand out in the darkness and they they will shine. And and he was absolutely right. Yeah, you know, a lot of my buddies from base were very supportable. A lot of my my my fellow colleagues in the medical division were reaching out and making sure I was okay. Yeah, I mean, they don't have to. We see each other once a month as a reservist, but they still reached out. Close friends from the hospital. You know, you have to have a support system, and the military knows about this. The military encourages us to have a support system.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

That's good, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

You know, so you know, I I I think everyone who suffers a trauma, what one thing I want them to know is is don't give up. You you are important and you are loved. You may not feel it at the moment, but you are loved and and you are and and they're out there. You have to wait for the darkest of moments to see to see the to see the brightness that is there.

SPEAKER_00 23:12

I couldn't agree more with that. I feel it's like a good place to kind of end our conversation, but uh the bot the bottom, the darkest of the dark. Honestly, I I I didn't see a way out. I honestly didn't see a way out. I looked up from the bottom of like a long dark tunnel that I felt like I'd fallen into and I couldn't see any light. And I couldn't agree more with what you're saying. It it there is hope that it is possible, right? And when you're feeling that dark and that down and I mean what you went through, I mean the divorce is one thing and how that makes you feel. Um, but just being on the front lines and being surrounded by all of that death and the experience of that tidal wave of what the what the fuck is this? Like I'm a I'm a patient, I'm an outsider. We would what I remember lining up at the Dodgers baseball stadium with 1,000 cars doing a drive-thru vaccine, you know. It was like something out of a fucking movie. It's like something out of outbreak, you know? Like what the hell is happening right now?

SPEAKER_01 24:10

You know, there was that movie uh 28 Days Later. Um that was an English film, that was really good, by the way. Yeah, that was an English film, and then and then there was the the other one, Contagion. Yeah, but you know, Contagion was almost 100% correct because I've one point in Contagion, they show everyone is fighting to get the vaccine. Yeah, the opposite happened, they're fighting not to get the vaccine.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

And I'm just like unbelievable.

SPEAKER_01 24:39

I could not have seen that happening, and and you know, sadly, are we over it? No, we're not over it. Uh no, I I I I think that physicians as a whole, we we suffer reputational damage from that, and and it's very hard to come back because here's don't forget what was happening. What was happening was you know, the CDC and the FDA, we worship these agencies, they're they're they're they are the word of the Lord, they can never be wrong, they can never be wrong. Yeah, so uh when they were sometimes wrong, they wouldn't admit it.

SPEAKER_00 25:10

That's it, of course.

SPEAKER_01 25:11

Yeah, yeah, that they would just say, Well, the data has changed. Okay, that's fine, the data has changed. A say the data has changed, and B, say you're sorry. Yeah, uh say you're sorry, yeah. It's okay to apologize. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you know, when you meet people, when you meet people, uh some people would say, Oh, yeah, don't apologize, that's for the weak. I disagree. I think there's a strength, there's a strength in acknowledging your weakness. When you apologize to someone, you're sure it takes strength to to acknowledge you were wrong publicly, and it takes strength to beg for forgiveness. There's a strength involved that the cowards are the ones who will never admit they're wrong. Cowards never want to look bad, and cowards will never say, I'm sorry, I was wrong, I misspoke. Cowards will never do that. There's a certain strength in looking at the public and saying, guys, I know we were recommending this, we were wrong. Uh, the data's come out, it's not working. We recommend this now, but uh, but we're sorry for what we said earlier. They never apologized. And and you know, there were people out there who who lost faith in our of course in our in our you know profession and our career. And unfortunately, there were a lot of doctors who were who were straight up cowards, you know. The the whole 53-year-old cardiologist retiring early, unless he suddenly hit the lottery, he had no reason to retire. Wow. This was this was messed up, yeah. They just wouldn't want to risk their their own lives. And you know, uh, I I just it it was it was a very, very shameful time to be a physician when all these guys are retiring. And then another thing I I remember was the a lot of these like medical directors, they were such cowards too, they refused to go to the ICU or run in the ICU or round in these in these in these special rooms because they argued, well, we're leadership, we have to be safe to lead the hospital. I'm like, oh, okay, so I'll go ahead and die for you instead. Uh and and it's fine. I I never talked back. I I I thought it was an honor and a pleasure uh to put my own life on the line to serve these people. I was I was if I died, I I felt if I died in the cause of helping others, then I satisfied my my my my duty as a physician. Uh it would be an honorable death to die serving serving others. I would be honored to to to to do it. But what I would never be honored was is retiring early to hide in my nice house in my comfortable BMW while while there are other people suffering.

SPEAKER_00 27:38

Well, thank you for coming on and and speaking your piece. I'm sorry you went through all of that. You know, it's I'm not.

SPEAKER_01 27:44

I learned a lot. I grew a lot. I I I sometimes thank God. You know what? When things bad things happen to you and you and you and you you grow from it, you you may maybe you needed it. You know, maybe you maybe we we needed it.

SPEAKER_00 27:55

That's how I feel as well. I mean, I I wouldn't want to do it again. I went through hell, but where I am today, I wouldn't change it for the world, you know.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

You're remarried, you got kids?

SPEAKER_00 28:03

No, remarried, but I've got a long-term girlfriend. I got my two boys, she's got two boys, we're all happy families. Ex-wife is in the picture, she's lives around the corner, you know. It's it's great. Everything's fab. Everything's great. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

How how how about that? I mean, maybe maybe you needed it. Maybe you and I needed our darkness to see the light for what it is.

SPEAKER_00 28:23

Yeah, I think you're right. Uh, Dr. Q, thank you so much for coming on uh in the show notes. We'll have any information about you, any uh any way you share uh care to share with us any uh socials or websites or anything. Just remains for me stated. Thank you for coming on and chatting to us today.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

A pleasure, it was a pleasure honor meeting you. We'll we'll do it again if possible.

SPEAKER_00 28:42

Anytime, Doctor. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Likewise, sir. Pleasure.