Tropical Storm Allison Deployment
Houston, TX
June 15-20, 2001
David Cary, RN, EMT-P
Here is a quick recap of my trip to Houston following Tropical Storm Allison.
The trip down was no indication of how the rest of the week would go. I made it to Houston on-time, but the hop between Houston International and a smaller airport (Hobbie) was delayed for 30 minutes while we stood out on the tarmac in 95 plus heat and humidity. For someone from the .dry. part of the state, I thought I would melt. We were finally allowed to board, but sat for over an hour on the plane with NO air conditioning on.
Finally arrived at Hobbie around 2300 hrs. to find that our transportation had left and our baggage had not arrived. There were no airline folks around that time of night , so all we could do is leave our names, but I had no idea where I was going or staying. That made it kind of tough for them to track me down. Got to the hotel and was told to report ay 0600 in the lobby for transport to an orientation.
We got our paper work out of the way and I was assigned to Ben Taub Memorial Hospital, which is their Level 1 trauma center on the night shift 7p-7a. This turned out to be a sweet assignment for me as the place was a zoo most of the time. Our job was to augment there existing staff and fill in where needed. There were 5 of us assigned to this shift, one from Seattle, one from Maine, one from California and the other from Alabama. Each had extensive ER backgrounds and were great to work with. The only catch was that the nurse supervisor at Ben Taub for the day shift was real stressed out and had a large problem dealing with us being around. It all worked out because the night shift super. was glad to have us help out and integrated us into her teams.
I worked 4 12-hr. shifts in a row and got a wealth of experience in the ER. Their system has a Triage nurse that sends the patents either to a holding area for TX or to one of the 6 .Shock. rooms they have. Once a patent was sent to a shock room, they got two large bore IV.s if they didn.t already have them, a Foley placed and labs drawn, no questions asked. We averaged 3 gunshot and 4 stabbing patients each night with as many as 7 GSW one night. The staff mentioned that it was kind of slow for there being a full moon, pay day and the flooding. I did get one picture of 7 ambulances backed up and unloading at one time.
We saw a patient that was .out. on PCP and it took 6 of us guys to hold her down. An unbelievable amount of MVA.s, with most ETOH related.
The NDMT staff did an excellent job working out the logistical problems associated with day/night shifts at 5 different hospitals scattered all over Houston.
A couple of things I did not get use to was the humidity or the mosquitoes that were EVERYWHERE due to the abundance of standing water. It was reported that the mosquitoes were so large that they had to ask for landing clearance before attempting to land or they would crash into each other.
All in all, the trip was a fantastic learning experience for me to work in a large, busy ER. I met some great people who showed me several new ways to do things and were interesting to be around. The Ben Taub staff helped us out and were great to work with. Most were very glad we were there and even invited us to their weekly pot luck. The NDMT command staff were all top notch and handled our requests and concerns with speed and professionalism. There were some major concerns with how our organization was being used in their VA hospital. It seems that ER/ICU nurses were being used as orderlies and .gofers. so the regular staff could have a lighter patient load. This issue was well on it.s way to being solved when I left.
Even though we stayed at a hotel, it was also a good .shake-down cruise. for me and my equipment. I definitely need to obtain a mosquito net before I go anywhere else!