Daniela Wiefhoff’s smartwatch counts. And counts. And counts. For hours on end. Almost every day. “At least 10,000 steps per shift,“ says the assistant doctor at Johanna Etienne Hospital in Neuss, North Rhine-Westphalia, as she taps away on the electronic watch on her wrist. Today could be another one of those days when anything can happen. “Every shift, every day is a surprise,“ she says.

For the orthopedic and trauma surgeon, no two days are the same. Fixed breaks? There aren’t any – at least not when Daniela is assigned to the emergency room. “I could never have imagined that the workload would be so extreme,“ Daniela says. She works 44 hours a week. At least. If she’s on call, it’s often significantly more.

Getting some rest – that doesn’t work in such situations.

During her shift, Daniela almost never sits down. Instead, she rushes from examination room to examination room. The sliding metal doors in the white-tiled hallway close behind her. The phones of the ward physicians ring. “At work, I just function,“ the 28-year-old trauma surgeon explains. “It’s incredible how long a person can function without taking care of herself.“ Daniela hasn’t even had a drink of water today.

She slams open the door of a treatment room where a patient is lying on the exam couch. Daniela introduces herself. “A day in the emergency room can be easy,“ she says. But it can also turn into the exact opposite. Simple back pain – or falls from a ladder while changing a light bulb, cuts from kitchen knives, traffic accidents: “Once it gets hectic, it gets really hectic,“ she says.

The fact that Daniela became a doctor has also something to do with her hobby: “I was a track and field athlete for a long time.“ Over and over again, she was confronted with injuries. Daniela realized that she wanted to do something to help others in their most difficult moments.

“As a doctor, I can help people – and feel like I’m giving back to society in a meaningful way.“ The gratitude that her patients give her in return is the greatest reward for Daniela. „This human sympathy that we get back is simply indescribable.“

In return, the trauma surgeon pushes herself to her limits every day – and sometimes beyond. During her endurance run through the ambulance maze, past metal doors and disinfection dispensers, Daniela doesn’t notice how exhausted she actually is. “When I’m working, I’m full of adrenaline,“ she says.

“It’s only when I get home and throw myself on the couch that I start to realize how completely drained my body is.“ Daniela’s feet and legs burn, pinch, and sting, and her head throbs. “I walk thousands of steps every day, and in the evening I realize how exhausting the clinic routine is.“ The better her shoes are, the less pain she has, she says.

But that alone is not enough.

To be able to care for her patients, Daniela has to be fit herself. If she’s not too exhausted and the day hasn’t been too long, she swaps her doctor’s coat for her running clothes in the evening. Despite a constant workload at the hospital, the 28-year-old trains about eight hours a week. “Exercising to stay fit helps me keep up with my workload,“ the ambitious triathlete says.

Daniela got into triathlon during the heatwave in the summer of 2018. “It was so hot back then,“ she says, “that I couldn’t really do anything but go swimming.“ Her partner, a former competitive swimmer, taught Daniela how to crawl. Throughout the summer, she grabbed her bike every day and rode to the pool. Then, she participated in her first triathlon in Zurich in 2019.