In the spring of 2021, the school principal and his family all contracted the disease. But Kapilik ended up in the hospital, where he stayed for four and a half months. That time included a pulmonary embolism, 70 days on a ventilator and 50 days in a medically induced coma from which doctors thought he might never emerge. By the time he woke up, the 47-year-old had to relearn how to walk and breathe. He had lost 100 pounds and missed his daughter’s 18th birthday and graduation. But he had renewed appreciation for simple things like going fishing and watching Winnipeg Blue Bombers games with his son. Kapilik missed his daughter Chloe’s graduation while he was in the hospital. But a few weeks after she came out of the coma, she put on her dress and visited him. (Submitted by Melanie Mazor Kapilik) Today, Métis, a father of three, is slowly coming back to life and reconnecting with his work at Marion School. Sitting under his apple tree in North Kildonan, he is grateful. “This is where I wanted to be, right? So for months, it’s, ‘I’ve got to get here.’ And then when I came home, this was kind of… the place I came to every day, [to] Sit in the yard and watch the birds and listen to the trees,” he said. “I’m very grateful to be here.” WATCHES | Corey Kapilik talks about his hospitalization:
Winnipeg principal is grateful after surviving months in hospital with COVID-19
Corey Kapilic spent more than four months in the hospital after contracting COVID-19 last year. That included 70 days on a ventilator and 50 days in a medically induced coma from which doctors believed he might never emerge. Kapilik, who was weeks away from being eligible for his first COVID-19 vaccination when he fell ill, still remembers calling his family from the hospital after learning he was going to be intubated. “When you talk to your kids and you have a few minutes to tell them what you need to tell them because you’re not sure what’s going to happen — I think that changed all of our lives,” he said. “It was hard. And being alone was really hard.” When he woke up, Kapilik said he realized he couldn’t move from the neck down because his muscles and nerves had deteriorated. But he also remembered taking comfort in hearing bedside conversations between his family once they were allowed inside. “There was a point where my kids, my mom and my siblings were called to visit me, even during COVID, because they didn’t think I was going to make it,” she said. “I remember … one of my brothers saying, ‘You know, let’s do this and get a fishing boat and fish every day now.’ Kapilik says his experience gave him a renewed appreciation for simple things like fishing. This June, he was finally well enough to do it again. (Submitted by Melanie Mazor Kapilik) Kapilik said his recovery is ongoing. Some days she can walk or hike, while others she feels short of breath. He has nerve damage in his feet and can’t move his right big toe. After speaking with a neurologist, he said he thinks it will be another year of nerve regeneration before he knows the long-term effects.
Range of long-term COVID symptoms
Dr. Alan Katz is part of it a team at the University of Manitoba researching the post-COVID situationalso known as long COVID, in the province. Katz said there are more than 100 symptoms that may indicate a person may have prolonged COVID-19 if they occur 90 days after infection. Shortness of breath and nerve damage are common, he said. But symptoms related to the gastrointestinal system and the heart have also been reported. While the virus that causes the disease is absorbed almost exclusively through the lungs, “one of the striking things about COVID is … it affects every system in the body,” said Katz, a professor of community health sciences and family medicine at the U.M. A stay in the intensive care unit alone — for any condition — can also leave a person recovering for months, he said. This leads to the challenge of determining whether a patient has long-term COVID-19, “or was the subsequent condition just because you were in the ICU for a very long time and your body shut down and you were very, very sick?” he said. Dr. Alan Katz is a professor of community health sciences and family medicine at the University of Manitoba and part of a research team looking at long-term COVID in the province. (Trevor Brine/CBC) Katz said, revealing more about long-term COVID, research as well as its goals to help the health care system prepare, doctors to diagnose and treat their patients and people to understand what they are experiencing. He urged people to seek medical help if they think they have long-term COVID. “There’s no cure, but there are other things we can do to help patients cope and help them recover,” he said.
I look forward
Although the virus brought him close to death, Kapilik said with two vaccinations and a booster dose, he is less worried about it now than he once was. “I think I would like people to know that there is recovery even from the darkest place that COVID could bring you. There is a possibility. There is a possibility,” he said. Kapilik poses with his wife, Melanie. She says she is grateful for all the support she had while in the hospital. (Submitted by Melanie Mazor Kapilik) But he said he wants people to know it’s a serious disease and hopes they stay diligent — if not just for themselves, but for the health care workers like those who saved his life. “We really need to listen to what people working in hospitals need right now because, you know, we’re not out of it. Inevitably there’s going to be something … else,” he said. Kapilik said he tries not to think too much about why he was able to come back from the brink when so many others didn’t. Info Radio – MB21:38 Winnipeg school principal who spent months in hospital talks about surviving COVID-19 At one point, Corey Kapilik’s family was rushed to his hospital bed because doctors thought he might not survive COVID-19. After spending four and a half months in hospital and 70 days on a ventilator, the Winnipeg manager talks about surviving COVID and what it’s like to know the disease is still out there. But he’s grateful for all the support he’s had while in hospital, from prayers from his mom’s church and a Sikh temple to elders and friends leaving flags at sun dance ceremonies. “There were a lot of prayers from a lot of different people and groups. A lot of positive energy. We worked really hard,” he said. “And a little luck in there.”
