Nurses Union comment on Dallas Hospital/Ebola

The great advanced Medical infrastructure of the United States!

Co-workers of a Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola from a sick patient say they worked for days without proper protective gear and that the hospital’s Ebola protocols and procedures were unclear and inadequate, leaving workers and hospital systems prone to contamination, according to a statement by the largest U.S. nurses’ union.

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More failures described here: Dallas Nurses Accuse Hospital of Sloppy Ebola Protocols - ABC News

Get your **** together, Texas!

If what the CDC was telling us was true, and the only precautions needed were standard contact precautions, then hospitals were perfectly prepared as far as equipment goes. We have patients who are on contact isolation on a regular basis. My concern is that CDC wasn't really being up front and honest about the transmission virility.

If you were told to treat a patient with Ebola, would you, or would you not, follow the instructions provided to you to a T, and if something required was not present, would you or would you not demand that it be?

Yep, now the Dallas nurses are talking.

Dallas nurses cite sloppy conditions in Ebola care.....

A Liberian Ebola patient was left in an open area of a Dallas emergency room for hours, and nurses treating him worked without proper protective gear and faced constantly changing protocols, according to a statement released by the nation's largest nurses' union. The CDC has said some breach of protocol probably sickened Pham, but National Nurses United contends the protocols were either non-existent or changed constantly after Duncan arrived in the emergency room by ambulance on Sept. 28.

Deborah Burger of National Nurses United, who convened a conference call with reporters to relay what she said were concerns of nurses at the hospital, said they were forced to use medical tape to secure openings in their flimsy garments and worried that their necks and heads were exposed as they cared for Duncan. RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of Nurses United, said the statement came from "several" and "a few" nurses, but she refused repeated inquiries to state how many. She said the organization had vetted the claims, and that the nurses cited were in a position to know what had occurred at the hospital. She did not specify whether they were among the nurses caring for Duncan.

The nurses allege that his lab samples were allowed to travel through the hospital's pneumatic tubes, possibly risking contaminating of the specimen-delivery system. They also said that hazardous waste was allowed to pile up to the ceiling. The nurses' statement said they had to "interact with Mr. Duncan with whatever protective equipment was available," even as he produced "a lot of contagious fluids." Duncan's medical records underscore that concern. They also say nurses treating Duncan were also caring for other patients in the hospital and that, in the face of constantly shifting guidelines, they were allowed to follow whichever ones they chose. When Ebola was suspected but unconfirmed, a doctor wrote that use of disposable shoe covers should also be considered. At that point, by all protocols, shoe covers should have been mandatory to prevent anyone from tracking contagious body fluids around the hospital.....snip~

Dallas nurses cite sloppy conditions in Ebola care

KevinKohler said:

If you were told to treat a patient with Ebola, would you, or would you not, follow the instructions provided to you to a T, and if something required was not present, would you or would you not demand that it be?

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Exactly!
The nurse who contracted it wasn't just a run-of-the-mill new grad, inexperienced nurse. She was a special care/ICU grade nurse. I expect that however it was transmitted to her was under very unusual circumstances. Since he was in the ICU and dying, he would have been intubated, which produces a lot of respiratory secretions. He was probably also having some serious gastrointestinal bleeding, if I were to take an educated guess. The only thing that comes to my mind that would have possibly caused a breach in standard precautions was an emergency situation in which CPR was in progress. Under that type of scenario, some unexpected and rushed things can happen.

lizzie said:

Exactly!
The nurse who contracted it wasn't just a run-of-the-mill new grad, inexperienced nurse. She was a special care/ICU grade nurse. I expect that however it was transmitted to her was under very unusual circumstances. Since he was in the ICU and dying, he would have been intubated, which produces a lot of respiratory secretions. He was probably also having some serious gastrointestinal bleeding, if I were to take an educated guess. The only thing that comes to my mind that would have possibly caused a breach in standard precautions was an emergency situation in which CPR was in progress. Under that type of scenario, some unexpected and rushed things can happen.

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That's Right Liz she was.....and she also kept notes of all that took place. Who came in and went out and what was worn etc. Even Duncan was keeping notes until he couldn't anymore.


A Texas nurse who contracted Ebola while caring for an infected Liberian man graduated from nursing school four years ago and was certified in critical care procedures two months before the disease arrived in the United States. Nurse Nina Pham understood the risks of working so close to one of the world's most feared viruses and tried to reassure her family that she would be safe. Pham's infection raised new questions about whether American hospitals and their staffs are adequately prepared to contain Ebola. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged Tuesday that Pham might not have been infected if a special response team had been sent to Dallas immediately after the Liberian patient was diagnosed.

The records make numerous mentions of protective gear worn by hospital staff, and Pham herself notes wearing the gear in visits to Duncan's room. But there is no indication in the records of her first encounter with Duncan, on Sept. 29, that Pham donned any protective gear. "I've been hearing loud and clear from health care workers from around the country that they're worried," said Frieden, who also said the CDC is considering whether Ebola patients should be transferred to one of four hospitals with specialized bio-containment units.

Though the CDC said a breach in protocol was probably to blame for Pham's infection, the man's illness was so complicated and rare that the risk of transmission would have existed at any hospital, experts said. "Even in the best of hospitals following all the protocol, we can minimize the risk to hospital personnel, but we can never eliminate it," said Dr. David Weber, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina's hospital. "They were notified in advance, 24, 48 hours — they had plenty of time to prepare, they were met at the door by people all garbed," Weber said. "That's a more controlled situation than a patient walking through the door that you think may or may not have Ebola." .....snip~

Nurse infected with Ebola knew risks of her work

MMC said:

[
Though the CDC said a breach in protocol was probably to blame for Pham's infection, the man's illness was so complicated and rare that the risk of transmission would have existed at any hospital, experts said. "Even in the best of hospitals following all the protocol, we can minimize the risk to hospital personnel, but we can never eliminate it," said Dr. David Weber, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina's hospital. "They were notified in advance, 24, 48 hours — they had plenty of time to prepare, they were met at the door by people all garbed," Weber said. "That's a more controlled situation than a patient walking through the door that you think may or may not have Ebola." .....snip~

Nurse infected with Ebola knew risks of her work

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All that may be true, but look at it this way. I've been a registered nurse for 30 years. I have worked with TB patients, meningitis patients, wound infected patients, MRSA and VRE patients, plus other infected patients. I've never (knock on wood) contracted any illness from taking care of very ill patients. This is one of the reasons I suspect that ebola is much more virulent than the CDC is letting on.

Now, Nina Pham's boy friend has become patient number 3. He works for Alcon and the Alcon CEO issued a letter stating confidence that all is well. Sounds like all these people should work for the Federal Reserve with all their confidence of this and confidence of that, but reality appears to be a spread of the Ebola in all the wrong places. The 2nd nurse diagnosed had flown from Ohio to Texas with a fever, but no vomiting or diarrhea. That's another 135 people on the plane and another 250 or so in the two terminals. Just another day at the office or the beginnings of an exponential progression?

lizzie said:

All that may be true, but look at it this way. I've been a registered nurse for 30 years. I have worked with TB patients, meningitis patients, wound infected patients, MRSA and VRE patients, plus other infected patients. I've never (knock on wood) contracted any illness from taking care of very ill patients. This is one of the reasons I suspect that ebola is much more virulent than the CDC is letting on.

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Well, things aren't looking so good for the second nurse that flew to into Cleveland and was out in Ohio. Which we have up in that thread. This CDC guy sent her to Atlanta. Here he admits a CDC response team should have went immediately to Dallas. Now he stated no others of the 76 will be allowed to travel until they get clearance to.

Plus now they are telling all on that flight to call the CDC.

Roadvirus said:

The great advanced Medical infrastructure of the United States!

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perhaps we might consider fixing it.

Deuce said:

Get your **** together, Texas!

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WTF are you blaming Texas?

It's the CDC that haven't prepared the nurses.
It's the CDC that let the second Ebola-infected nurse travel