Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast of the United States and caused much damage. Images of the destruction are all over the internet. In the midst of the flooding, New York hospital workers safely evacuated four newborns who were on ventilators.
Hurricane Sandy, (which was also called a “Frankenstorm”), hit the Eastern Coast of the United States this week. It caused flooding, power outages, destruction, and deaths. Photos of the damage have been passed around the internet.
The storm caused damage at the NYU Langone Medical Center. Between 7:00 and 7:45 in the evening on Monday, October 29, 2012, the hospital experienced a massive amount of flooding. The basement, the lower floors of the hospital, and the elevator shafts filled with between 10 to 12 feet of water. The power went out, and many of the generators failed.
Some of the people who were in the hospital had been evacuated before this occurred. However, the hospital did not accurately anticipate the amount of flooding that would happen, so it did not evacuate all of the patients before the Sandy hit. This meant that the hospital needed to get the remaining patients out of the building quickly.
Among the patients who were still in the hospital were four newborn babies. Each baby was on a respirator that was breathing for them. Nurses carried the babies down nine flights of stairs while manually squeezing a bag that would deliver air into their lungs. Adult respirators are battery powered, but the ones for the infants were not. The nurses were using flashlights to light their way as they transported the babies down the stairs.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta explained how difficult this would be to attempt. He pointed out that there are many things that can go wrong when a patient is being transported. Breathing tubes can come out. The person who is doing the manual ventilation can get tired. In this situation, the nurses were transporting babies, who breathe faster than adults, which makes helping them breathe more strenuous than you might expect. He went on to say:
“But just getting outside in the middle of a storm… body temperature can change, heart rate, blood pressure. So there are a lot of things to monitor even within the hospital. During a transport all that becomes much more difficult.”
In my opinion, all nurses are heroes. They are lifesavers. The actions that these nurses took to save four babies who had special needs was incredibly heroic.
Image by NASA Goddard Photo and Video on Flickr