BizNewOrleans.com, October 28, 2005

New Orleans - West Jefferson Medical Center will hold a job fair for nurses, certified nursing assistants, other health professionals on Friday, Nov. 4. The event will run from 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM in the Fonseca Auditorium on the first floor of the hospital in the Hall of History. West Jefferson Medical Center is located at 1101 Medical Center Blvd.

The center will offer permanent positions to nurses and other health care professionals who are currently not working due to the hurricanes. ... Medical

Advocate, October 19, 2005

The State Board of Nursing approved emergency rules to extend the annual license expiration date to March 31 and to waive the 2005 continuing education requirements to re-license registered nurses and advanced practice registered nurses.

The board took the action in a special meeting Oct. 5 to address issues related to the recent hurricanes.

The board also voted unanimously to move its headquarters to Baton Rouge by June 2008. The board ratified the action of the executive director in securing temporary offices at 5207 Essen Lane, Suite 6. ... Nursing

Chris Hamilton, Knight Ridder Newspapers, October 18, 2005

Joe Ann Clark, the executive director of the Louisiana State Nurses Association, said she gets recruiting calls every day from hospitals across the country desperate to hire away as many of New Orleans' roughly 13,000 displaced nurses as they can.

With the nation facing a nursing shortage, Clark is struggling to keep nurses in the state so they can return to work if and when the decimated health-care system is rebuilt. But it's not been easy. One California hospital is offering $42 an hour and a $13,000 signing bonus, she said. ... New Orleans

Reuters, October 5, 2005

Washington - Charity Hospital in New Orleans, which captured the sympathy of the nation as it struggled to evacuate patients from the chaos and destruction brought by Hurricane Katrina last month, cannot be saved and will be closed, officials said on Wednesday.

The Louisiana State University Health Care Services Division said the Charity and University Hospitals were too heavily damaged and were unsalvageable. ... Flood-damaged

Associated Press, October 5, 2005

New Orleans' two public hospitals should be torn down because the damage inflicted by Hurricane Katrina has left them "dangerous, dangerous places," the head of Louisiana's charity hospital system said Wednesday.

Charity and University hospitals "were issued their death warrant by Katrina and the cataclysmic floods it spawned," Donald R. Smithburg told the Louisiana State University Board of Supervisors.

"Even before the storms, these old facilities were on the ropes," he said, noting that Charity was built in the 1930s and University in the 1960s. ... Official

Veronica Cisneros, The Nicholls Worth - News, September 29, 2005

Evacuees with special needs have occupied Betsy Cheramie Ayo Hall since Hurricane Katrina neared the Louisiana coast, resulting particularly in the relocation of nursing classes and students.

All sophomore and one junior lecture and lab nursing classes were moved in Beauregard Hall. ... Student nurses

Hurricane Katrina forced many nurses to find work outside the Bayou State. What if they never go back?
Mark E. Dixon, Advance for Nurses, September 29, 2005

Nurses displaced by Hurricane Katrina are now living - and working - in surrounding states and beyond.

How many will eventually come home is unknown, say Louisiana nursing officials, who nevertheless worry the storm could leave the state with a shortage.

In the past, Louisiana has not suffered a nursing shortage to the same degree as other states. ... Displaced

Maria Cramer, Boston Globe, September 27, 2005

Lake Charles - At one of two functioning hospitals in this city, exhausted medical staff rushed around in sweaty scrubs, getting water from a city truck parked in the loading dock, and sleeping in the building's sweltering atrium.

''I just want to get out of Lake Charles," Deena LeBlanc, the only ultrasound technician left at Christus St. Patrick Hospital said yesterday. ''I want to go hug my mom. That's what I want to do." ... Healthcare

Nuns Labored for Days in Fatal Heat to Get Help for Patients.
Anne Hull & Doug Struck, Washington Post, September 23, 2005

New Orleans - As Hurricane Katrina swirled closer, the elderly nuns who were among the patients at Lafon Nursing Home of the Holy Family packed their medicine and emergency supplies in preparation for evacuation. A sign-out sheet at the nursing home's front desk recorded their departures on the morning of Aug. 27. Sister Paulette signed out at 7:24 AM, Sister DeSalle at 7:25, Sister Trahan at 7:27, Sisters Jolivete and Miriam at 7:30 and Sister Brinkley at 7:32. ... At Nursing Home

Maggie Fox, Reuters, September 21, 2005

New Orleans - Dr. Peter De Blieux struggled for four days to get desperate and impoverished patients safely out of flooded Charity Hospital in downtown New Orleans. Now he is fighting to get them back.

Dr. Ben deBoisblanc watched in frustration as helicopter after helicopter swept away patients and even able-bodied staff from the for-profit hospital across the flooded street from Charity, while two of his own desperately ill patients died after waiting for hours for help. ... Hospital forgotten

Maggie Fox, Reuters, September 15, 2005

New Orleans - The 3,000 people packed into East Jefferson General Hospital just outside New Orleans could not stay away from the windows, fascinated to see Hurricane Katrina blow over trees and batter buildings.

"By morning we saw the water rising. That was when we saw the nursing home across the street was still occupied," said Beverly Marino, a nurse in the hospital's emergency department. ... When Katrina

Sewell Chan & Gardiner Harris, New York Times, September 14, 2005

Baton Rouge - Confusion and desperation permeated the New Orleans hospital system as floodwaters rose, emergency generators failed and dozens of patients died in the three chaotic days after the levees broke, doctors and other witnesses said on Tuesday.

While all of the city's major hospitals had detailed evacuation and emergency plans, officials said, none were prepared for a catastrophic flood. And each responded differently when disaster struck. ... Hurricane

Desperate efforts amid many deaths.
Stephen Smith & Marcella Bombardieri, Boston Globe, September 14, 2005

Gonzales - As flood waters rose in the wake of Hurricane Katrina's fury, Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans ran out of the diesel fuel that powered its generators. Gunfire crackled in the streets, sometimes aimed at the rescue helicopters and boats that arrived only intermittently. Food stocks were running low, and toilets were overflowing. ... Power

Adam Nossiter, Associated Press, September 13, 2005

New Orleans - Officials got ready for the arrival Tuesday of the first commercial flight at New Orleans' airport since Hurricane Katrina hit, and the coroner said autopsies were planned for the bodies of at least 44 people found at a hospital.

The exact number of bodies recovered Sunday from the 317-bed Memorial Medical Center was unclear. A state official said the bodies of 45 patients were found; a hospital administrator said there were 44, plus three on the grounds. ... Flights

FEMA chief quits; Bush views city.
Christopher Rowland & Stephen Smith, Boston Globe, September 13, 2005

New Orleans - Forty-four bodies have been recovered in an evacuated hospital, officials announced yesterday, as the federal official in charge of the initial response to Hurricane Katrina resigned under fire, and as President Bush took a firsthand look at flood damage in parts of the city. ... 44 found dead