Post Traumatic stress after Katrina

grandee3 · Sep 22, 2005

I'm doing research on crisis/disaster nursing. Is there anyone willing to share their stories pre-Katrina about preparedness and post- Katrina about dealing with the decisions you made during the crisis? This information could help many nurses deal with future situations of this nature.
Thank you.

I am a nurse in New Orleans. i worked for a large corporation that run 3 hospitals in and around the metro area. My campus was in St Bernard Parish.

I was fired a week after the storm because I had to leave town with a very seriously ill family member. I do not regret the decision I made and take full responsibility.

i lost my job, my house had 2 feet of water in it and is growing mold at a rapid pace, my place of employment was in the hardest hit area and no longer exist.

To all of this I can only say myself, my family, friends, co workers are alive and well and I thank God for that.

At a time like this I can only move forward, not look back and take every precious moment to start over and prepare for the future. I am 58 years old and have always worked in the healthcare field. I have only been a nurse for 10 years. It has been a life long dream and I'm not ready to give it up. I love what I do and hope to continue for years to come.

grannynurse FNP student · Sep 22, 2005

I'm doing research on crisis/disaster nursing. Is there anyone willing to share their stories pre-Katrina about preparedness and post- Katrina about dealing with the decisions you made during the crisis? This information could help many nurses deal with future situations of this nature.
Thank you.

I am a disabled nurse who lived thru Charlie taking a direct hit on my town. He was a cat 4. I can share with you the impact he had on myself and the staff of the hospital I use regularily, if you like.

Grannynurse :balloons:

suzanne4, RN · Sep 22, 2005

I am a nurse in New Orleans. i worked for a large corporation that run 3 hospitals in and around the metro area. My campus was in St Bernard Parish.
I was fired a week after the storm because I had to leave town with a very seriously ill family member. I do not regret the decision I made and take full responsibility.
i lost my job, my house had 2 feet of water in it and is growing mold at a rapid pace, my place of employment was in the hardest hit area and no longer exist.
To all of this I can only say myself, my family, friends, co workers are alive and well and I thank God for that.
At a time like this I can only move forward, not look back and take every precious moment to start over and prepare for the future. I am 58 years old and have always worked in the healthcare field. I have only been a nurse for 10 years. It has been a life long dream and I'm not ready to give it up. I love what I do and hope to continue for years to come.

Sorry for your loss. Do you have any idea of what you are going to do next?

ascnbe, ADN, RN · Sep 23, 2005

I live in Metairie a suburb of New Orleans. I did not do activation team this year for the first time in 10 years and I actually felt very guilty when I saw my friends on TV. I felt like I had let them down. They were stuck in the ER at Charity for a week with no power, a flooded basement (where the morgue and the cafeteria are both located) They were forced to go up to the second floor because of water and armed looters, no AC and record heat. So could I have made it any better, probably not, but at least I would have been there.

I watched on TV and kept feeling this desire to try to get to them and do something, anything other than sit there and watch it. The nurses I have seen since they evacuated seem to be handling it OK for now. They may not really have had time to work on it in their heads. We are now under the gun again with Rita. Many of them are now homeless, and even though we are getting emergency pay, the last word was Charity and University (our east and west campuses) are not going to re open. For those of us that have been there for a while, it is a loss of not just the physical property, our entire lives will never be the same. The lifestyle, the friends, the interaction, it is all gone. We will still have the friends, but our relationship will be out of context. The place was a hell hole to work in, but we had a core group that made it home. I think it has yet to sink in for most of us. We have gotten together for dinners, you can see the uncertainty in their eyes. It is like being jerked into another dimension, the people are the same, but the world is different. We are going to be split up and redistributed to other Charity hospitals around the state. Some of us may go to work in Field hospitals in the city, I can only hope that most of us can end up together in whatever they set up. Working in the ER we see lives change in seconds because of accidents, MI's, etc. This was like an MI that was communicable, we all got a dose of it, those that stayed and those that will never get to go back.

tencat · Sep 23, 2005

Those who survived Katrina..... :icon_hug:

I can't pretend I know what it was like, because I have no idea what it meant to be caught up in it. But I do send prayers and best wishes for your healing, be it physical or spiritual.

ascnbe, ADN, RN · Sep 23, 2005

Those who survived Katrina..... :icon_hug:
I can't pretend I know what it was like, because I have no idea what it meant to be caught up in it. But I do send prayers and best wishes for your healing, be it physical or spiritual.

I appreciate it. I am one of the lucky ones, really.

laurakoko · Oct 14, 2005

Let me start by saying, I live in Mandeville, LA. (and am from Lakeview in New Orleans.) Not far from the rest of you. It is beyond reality that when a government official reports the New Orleans area is in danger from a disaster, and mandates evacuation of the city, and all outlying parishes.......... WHY WERE THE HOSPITALS EXEMPT ??????????????????

Buses, Trains, Planes, Helicopters, Cruise ships should have come and tranferred every patient, family member, with the nursing, staff, and MDs to other hospitals............ people would not have suffered like they did.

I have had this fear of evacuation and losing my job for YEARS. My husband is a Captain on the fire dept in Kenner, and HAS to report during disasters. (Thank- him). So it is ME who needs to care for my 3 children, and the rest of my family. Doesn't exempt me from getting fired........ However, all of my family is accounted for, and although we live all over the country now, we are LIVING. I wasn't bringing my 12, 3, and 2 yr old to a mandatory evacuated area...........

My hands up to those who took care of others during the storm. And all of you who suffered. It was your hospital's decision to make the suffering happen. I know BLAMING is wrong, but wrong decisions should be blamed.

I know firsthand as well. My hospital, in 1998 or so, Hurricane Georges.... the CEO of my facility, did the RIGHT thing, and evacuated all of the patients, staff, nurses..NORTH, to higher lying areas. I went. Stayed for a week. Yeah, wasn't great... but we had shelter, water, food, and power.

Even in this storm, I evacuated, went to Houston. And did my part as an RN, volunteering at the Astrodome... and when I got home, worked many extra hours for relief for others.

I am also venting, with my own post trauma.........

ascnbe, ADN, RN · Oct 14, 2005

Now, adding to the problem is the state is planning to close Charity and University Hospitals. We took care of the vast majority of the uninsured patients in the area. It is estimated that there are 60-75000 more uninsured since the storm and the loss of jobs. Where are those people going to go? Not to mention all the nurses and support people that worked in those facilities. The governor mandated disaster pay for the state workers until 11/6/05, then they are putting us on unpaid furlough. Since we are on furlough we can't get unemployment. We can't claim seniority for another state facility. We will be on unpaid furlough from 11/7 to 01/06/2006. Then they will start the layoff process. I have done some volunteer work, but will soon have to move on, I guess. With no plans to rebuild Charity or University, I will have to move closer to one of the other Charity hospitals or move out of the state system. And God help the folks with no insurance, cause they will have no place to go. We have been the dumping ground for all the indigent patients for the entire southern half of the state. All the private hospitals use the "you can get that surgery here, but you will need 5000.00 cash, or you can go to Charity and get it done for free" line to get folks to request transfers. That option will no longer exist. They have lost their homes, jobs, and now their only option for healthcare. We are seeing them in a tent now, but I don't know how long they will allow us to do that. It is going to be an interesting time over the next year to see where the city and it's heart takes it. I keep hearing the phrase "don't let the city that care forgot, become the city that forgot to care" I hope our legislators have that same sentiment. Before the storm our ER's saw about 300 patients a day and we were their primary care. Without Charity, our patients will not make it. We weren't pretty, but we saved lives and kept folks healthy that had no alternative.

Cajun LMT · Oct 14, 2005

Guess Slidell will be busy for a while cause the only thing really between Slidell and Gulfport memorial is Hancock General and don't if any of you hoped the line to go see Waveland and the Bay but it pretty much doesn't exist anymore. The hospital there is in wal-mart parking lot. It is amazing the devastation, the house I spent 25 years in from a baby, I drove right past. The road I grew up on Coleman Ave. is one long pile of debris and nothing stands.

I was hoping to go to work at charity or university when I finish up here in Ga. And move back home to Waveland. But since my house is gone, and the only thing I could find was my roof about ½ a mile down the road it doesn't look to promising. At least my parents now have a FEMA trailer after spending 6 weeks in tent in the weather.

Hopefully something will be done there is so many people who have lost everything including jobs and health insurance. However I say that something will be done but one of the things I think what we as community need to do is start really lobbying now for whatever we can get.

You hear allot about the slow response to N.O. parishes, but no one is really talking about the lack of presence of FEMA and American Red Cross Still in places like Waveland and Bay St. Louis, Ms. We are still 7 weeks after the storm trying to recover bodies from the miles and miles of total devastation.

I have a web site set up to chronicles the areas of Waveland, Bay St. Louis, Diamondhead and Pass Christian but since it has a donation link I can't post it in the thread feel free to PM for the address.

Mat Price

laurakoko · Oct 15, 2005

I have heard about the non- reopening of Charity and University Hospitals... what NOW ??????? You are so correct. On top of the Charity system helping the people without insurance, on welfare, or low income..... it helped LOTS of people WITH insurance and money. It is (was) the major trauma center of New Orleans. Not to also mention the educational central for almost all MDs and nurses.... Not opening Charity, is utterly unbelieveable. And what the state is doing to the staff with the pay... I can't understand, and NEED to just hold my tongue, in lieu of saying very bad things about the government of this state. Another entire forum.............

I work for HCA, on the Northshore... we are supposed to be "expanding", to be another trauma and transplant center!!! Not only do we not have ROOM, (the hospital is SOOOO small), we don't have staff, and are stuffed with patients now. We have NEVER done transplants of any kind, and major trauma, and critical babies, were shipped to Tulane, Charity, Ochsner, and Children's. We are now, seeing the self-pay, and medicaid pending... and being a case manager, it is not fun. I don't know what to say to the self pay patients who are medically stable, need rehab, from falling off their roof, helping friends... "well, I know you can't function now, and go to the bathroom alone, but there's not a place around that can help you for P.T., or other services. "

The population in Mandeville/Covington, feels like it has quadrupled. The traffic..... and our city roads couldn't handle the residents BEFORE the storm. ( I know this is true of many areas as well.)

As far as Mississippi, the rest of the Gulf Coast, Slidell..... it is really not mentioned. And it is sad, as Slidell, St Bernard, Waveland, Biloxi, and all the towns around and between, are almost gone. ( I saw a special on the discovery channel- not local news- called "How the levees failed".....) Very interesting, but it made like the hurricane only affected New Orleans. Well, we who live here, all know different.

AND another vent.......... how can FEMA pick some eligible for money, and turn away others...................... WTF????????????????????

Every household in every evacuated area, and areas with damage, should receive FEMA. Oh, back on the government again... I'll go.