Forwarding Bill's personal account of the hurricane aftermath.
Mom
>>> 09/03/05 11:17 AM >>>
Hello:
If you don't want to read anything else about the human tragedy being played out in America', please do not read any further. Erase this email. If you want to learn more from first hand accounts, then proceed.
I just came off a twelve hour shift at the refugee triage and 500+ bed hospital bed facilities that used to be LSU's PMAC Center mini-superdome) and field house (huge in-door tack facility). I functioned as a social worker/mental health counselor dealing with refugee issues.
We had processed more than 10,000 people when I left. Most were brought by bus, some by helicopter, 150 arrived in the closed trailer of an 18 wheeler where there was standing room only. FEMA workers, doctors, nurses, social workers and volunteers of every description met new arrivals. Some had showed and wore donated cloths, others were ripe with the odors of polluted brackish water and human waste.Most had been fed by the time they arrived, some had not. Medical Worker wore surgical masks, protective clothing and gloves.
After initial processing (showering, medical examination, feeding, information gathering), they were brought the field house where I was located and where another round of triage took place. [Those in need of some sort of surgery were taken to a temporary MASH like surgical structure.] Some moved from the field house to other shelters in other areas of the state; currently there are an estimated 30,000+ in the greater BR area. Others were placed in one of the color coded wards and cots/air mattresses on the floor of the makeshift hospital for continuous care. Only the most serious cases were hospitalized, the others were moved on to shelters.
If you have ever visited a hospital or critical care nursing facility, you can imagine the full range of human physical and mental ailments that were packed into makeshift beds on that in-door field track. These ranged from a 2 year old boy dying of cancer and his caregiver mother to an 87 year old woman whose son had just died because of heat prostration, awaiting pickup on what used to be an Interstate, whose only concern was how to burry her dead son.
Mentally ill people who had been without their meds for some time, and had to be dealt with. People with cut or broken ankles and legs, infected from walking in waist deep (or in some cases neck) contaminated water. People with diseases and conditions who had been cared for in nursing homes or hospitals.
Our jobs were to deal with the emotional and mental health issues that these victims came to us with, some of which I have already described above. Many did not want to be relocated. [In fact one, refugee went into a rage while on one of the refugee buses when he learned that he was being taken to Opalusus (sp) north of Lafayette that he grabbed the wheel of the bus, causing it to turn over, killing one and injuring many.] Most were distraught over worrying about what happened to relatives. Others worried about pets. Most had not yet processed their feelings at loosing their homes or businesses and all their material possessions.
All had stories of escape and survival that could fill volumes of books.
One family of nine refused rescue two days prior because the boat was not big enough for all to fit in it. When they were finally picked up, they had spent five days on a roof top. One of the men was a nurse, and after being processed, fed and cared for, volunteered to continue working as a nurse and the rest of his family were moved to shelters in other areas.
One teacher from Orleans shared the account that she had attempted to leave NO and drove miles to find gas, but could not, so she returned home with her dog and cat. When the water came, her home filled within 45 minutes. She survived by forcing out ceiling tiles, and climbed into her attic only after pushing up her cat and Labrador retriever. She spent two nights hugging the ceiling boards, as snakes and other "things" swam by, inches from her. She heard someone calling and she yelled back. After the rescuer kicked out an eve plate, she was able to crawl out the hole, but only after handing the rescuer her cat and dog first.
In another case, a man was the director of a state run facility in Bellchase (sp). He evacuated his charges, but stayed at the facility until the waters forced him on the roof of the administration building where he stayed four days until rescued.
What you are seeing on TV is only a very small slice of the continuing human misery that is now southern Louisiana. Below is a copy of an email that I received from one of our Interns.
I think that I will end now. I need some sleep before I pull my next twelve hours. Be thankful that you are where you are today.
Bill
Email received: 9AM this morning
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I finally reached members of my family today. My cousin is a nurse at Charity Hospital, Chris Keaton. He has been there through this storm with no food and no water. The nurses are giving each other IV fluids to stay alive. Many, many of the people there have died and they are stacking them in the stairwells. The stench is getting really bad. Chris works in the psychiatric lock down unit. There are no med's left for the patients. No food, nothing. He fears they are left for dead. His mother contacted Senator Landrieu's office and she made arrangements to get them out, she even called and spoke with Chris himself. However, the director of Health and Hospitals cancelled the rescue, stating the mental patients were a liability and they would not be moved. Many of the other patients have been removed and their nurses left there to die.
Is there anyone, anyone you know who could help with this situation. Chris says he is sweating profusely, starving, thirsty and is getting very ill. He fears he will not make it out of there as so many others so far have not.
Chris was interviewed on national tv about the situation, however, he was reprimanded for speaking to anyone about it. The next day the media tried to contact him, but they would not allow him to talk.
One of the things we need to think about as social workers is that after this is over, many people will be angry, suffering PTSD, they will feel much like Vietnam Vets, like they were left there to die.
If there is anything you can do please let me know. I am going to go to the grocery today and see if I can get to my neighborhood to feed some of the elderly that I know cannot get out.
Thanks,
Donna
Another email from Bill.
>>> 09/03/05 2:10 PM >>>
I know that there is a bed downstairs somewhere, and that I will find it. However, communications are essential. As of a few minutes ago, I was advised that all the staff and all the patients of the Charity Hospital in NO have or are currently being evacuated to Pineville, LA.
I want to share one more story. OCS (Office of Children Service) workers stayed with children and their families, protecting them as best they could until last night when they were brought to the LSU center. Most of them were in the NO Superdome, and lived through the horrors of the past four days that you have heard about on TV and the media. But to a person, this group of twenty-six people, mostly African-American women who had their own homes destroyed and many of whom had lost contact with their own families, made an agreement not to describe what they saw. When interviewed, they would only say that what they observed were horrors that no human should have to live with and did their best to shield their children from abuse. According to one of the officers that I talked to, several of these workers offered themselves to rapists and thugs who preyed on weaker victims, in order to protect the children.
Also, there was a group of Interns, doctors and nurses who were "forcibly removed" by troops yesterday from one of the hospitals and brought to the LSU center. They did not want to leave their patients who could not be evacuated until today. Knowing that some of his patients would die in that period, one doctor collapsed in front of the Assembly Center where I was stationed, fell to his knees crying and swearing to give up medicine.
These groups of OCS workers, doctors, nurses and interns are the real heroes of this ordeal. It is encouraging to know that there are people that dedicated to the welfare of others. It allows us to balance our perspective of others animalistic humans that prey on weaker people.
Good night.
Bill
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