Katrina-character eyewitness story by Chief Nursing Officer
We have all been touched in some way by the devastation left in the
path of
Katrina. Whether it be loved ones whom we have not heard from and do
not know
their fate, friends or business associates. I received this email below
and felt
compelled to share it with you. Please read below..........
This is a humbling and chilling account of just one area hit by
Hurricane Katrina.
But for the grace of God, we each could be experiencing similar loss
and devastation.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Friday, September 02, 2005 2:04 PM
An email to a fellow nurse from the CNO at Biloxi....
We just got our e-mail up and running. I hope this actually goes
through! It
must have been your prayers that saved us. If you came down here and
saw
first hand the death and destruction on the coast from Ocean Springs to
Waveland Mississippi, you would see that there is NO WAY, Biloxi
Regional
Medical Center should still be standing!!!!
All of our staff, to the best of our knowledge survived the storm as
far as
there was no major injury or death. Everyone is blessed to be alive. A
large
percentage of our staff have suffered catastrophic losses of homes and
belongings. Many, many, many of us have lost absolutely everything we
own,
myself included. My home was in an area, in Pass Christian that is so
badly
demolished, that the national guard and EOC cannot even get to it yet.
Some
of my pets were in a kennel in Pass Christian that more than likely no
longer
exists. Everyone continues to put all of the personal loss behind them
and tend
to the patients, our first priority. It is only in the silence of a
broken heart, when
alone for a few minutes, or with a trusted co-worker, that the tears
flow, briefly
and then it is back to business. I do believe that most of the patients
do not
know the extent of the loss of the healthcare workers that are caring
for them.
And, they shouldn't know it. It should not be their burden.
You would not believe it here. The city of Biloxi has no water, so we
have had
no water to run our air conditioners. Of course we have had mid 90
degree
weather. Inside, it has to be well over 100 degrees. Of course, this
also means
that we cannot bathe or flush toilets. Think of 100 degrees, nobody
bathing and
no toilets flushing. Can you spell "STINK?" We must constantly watch
the staff
for heat exhaustion in addition to watching the patients for the same
thing. We
have had only generator power, so needless to say, in order to conserve
the
generator power, there were frequent and extended times that the
elevators
were not working. (We have 6 floors in our hospital.)
We had been cut off from all outside communication. During the storm,
we lost
cable, so could not monitor the weather. Our EOC radio did not work,
the phones
went down and the cell phones would work very sporadically. Windows in
patient
rooms started flying in and we had to evacuate the patients out of
their rooms
and into the hallways. As windows continued to fly in and ceiling tiles
were ripped
from the ceiling in the rooms where the windows blew in, glass was
flying all over
the room. We had to try to nail the doors shut, because after a certain
time, the
broken windows were trying to suck things out of the window.
We then had to evacuate the 6th floor patients to the 1st floor. We no
sooner
got 38 patients from Med Surg down to the first floor, when it became
apparent
that the Gulf of Mexico was in our hospital loading dock, just about
ready to lap
over into the ER.
Things were flying off of our roof, patient rooms were leaking, not
really from the
roof, but the force of the wind, close to 145 mph, was driving the rain
straight
through our bricks. Water was then seeping down onto the ceiling of the
floors
below and then that started the whole domino effect of ceiling tiles
falling, thing
getting ruined by water coming through the ceiling, etc. When the
storm ended,
we were all still alive. We didn't have any idea of what it looked like
outside of our
little world.
We finally were able to start getting in touch with corporate and once
that
happened and they started getting a list of our needs, things got
mobilized really
fast. I cannot say enough about Health Management Associates (HMA)!
They
are busting it, trying to get our every need met! Our sister HMA
employees are
arriving to help and they are a godsend! Supplies and ice and fuel and
clothes
and cigarettes and chocolate and our every need is being seen to! You
would
just break down and cry if you could see the response from our
Mississippi
Division and all of Corporate and our sister hospitals!
Homeland Security is here and there are Federal Police protecting our
ER doors.
The National Guard is here, NDMS is here and it is overwhelming to see
all of this
all in and around our beautiful little hospital.
Tonight, for the first time since the storm, we have some air
conditioning going.
We are not sure how long it will last, but we believe that as we sleep
on the floors
all over the hospital tonight, we'll get some sleep for the first time.
We are running
out of food and we do hope that a food truck will reach us tomorrow. It
was
supposed to have come yesterday and did not make it. I cannot say
enough
about the staff of BRMC! Through the entire 12 hour beating this
hospital took,
even with moving patients all over this hospital to the best area of
safety, one
step ahead of the storm, only 1 of our patients had any anxiety. She
was a
mom with a potential PE, with a 4 DAY old baby in her arms. That is a
tribute to
our staff, that the patients never panicked. Because the staff never
let on how
scared they were. They were calm and confident, professional and
positive.
It has been and remains, an experience like no other. Yesterday
evening, I got
my first chance to get out of the building and walk around a little
bit. It is 100%
totally overwhelming. It smells like death and destruction. It looks
like someone
dropped the big one on us. Almost everything is gone or has moved to a
new
location. Our ER and grounds look like a M.A.S.H. Unit. There are
injured
people everywhere! Our morgue is filling up. There are not enough
shelters for
the stranded, hungry thirsty people that are approaching our hospital
hourly. We
had a young man arrive to our ER and die today with a body temp of 108!
We
have snake bite victims, people who are already septic with Vibrio
because of 7
hour swims clinging to trees after having been blown out into the
storm.
Our nurses, doctors, techs, therapists, HMA everyone has been fantastic
throughout! The commitment and dedication to the great responsibility
of caring
for the patients in our community that have been entrusted to our care
and
protection has been evident this week. It is an awesome and humbling
experience,
to say that I am their Chief Nursing Officer. With a lesser crew, we
would not have
survived as long as we have. I can't say that I wish this experience on
anyone, but
I do know that it is and will continue to be a life changing
experience.
Feel free to share this e-mail with anyone that is interested. God
bless you and
thank you for thinking of us!
