Charlotte Regional Medical Center, still using tents for emergency patients, expects to be closed at least three weeks. The other two hospitals have open ER facilities, but no projections for reopening fully.
By WILLIAM R. LEVESQUE
Published August 16, 2004
PUNTA GORDA - Mary Gilmore was frantic Sunday as she pulled up to storm-battered Charlotte Regional Medical Center looking for her elderly father.
William Gilmore, 82, had been admitted to the hospital before Hurricane Charley with chest pains. With all the hospital's patients evacuated since the storm, the daughter had no idea of his location or condition.
"I've been crying all night," Gilmore, 35, said as she sought information from a hospital worker in a darkened emergency room lobby. "Yesterday they told me he was in Sarasota. But I called, and they couldn't find him. I'm shaking with worry. Where is he?"
Once staff members using cell phones located him in Fort Myers, Gilmore raced away to see him.
Charlotte County's three hurricane-damaged hospitals finished the evacuation of all of nearly 350 admitted patients by Sunday to facilities as far away as St. Petersburg and as close as Fort Myers, 25 miles away.
Now the priority is to assess the damage and figure out what it will take to fully reopen the three facilities.
"It's a major problem for Charlotte County residents," said Michael Curran, chief operating officer of Charlotte Regional. "We're working around the clock to get up and running again."
The emergency rooms of Fawcett Memorial Hospital and Bon Secours-St. Joseph in Port Charlotte remain open, though critically ill patients must be transferred northward by ambulance or helicopter, hospital officials say.
Charlotte Regional officials say they expect it to be closed for three to four weeks, including the emergency room.
Federal and state disaster officials have set up tents adjacent to the hospital to treat emergency patients.
Officials at the other two hospitals have no estimates on when they will reopen fully, though their buildings sustained far less damage than Charlotte Regional in Punta Gorda.
All three hospitals lost electricity and water and sustained damage from Charley's winds, though none sustained serious structural damage, officials say.
At least until the electricity comes back on in the county, anyone requiring inpatient care must make the drive to Sarasota or Fort Myers.
Complete numbers of storm-related injuries were unavailable Sunday, though hospital officials said they had seen relatively few.
Charlotte Regional, the only hospital to provide figures, said 50 injured people arrived in the hours after the storm.
Near Charley's landfall, staff at Charlotte Regional worked amid the greatest chaos.
Roseanne Terranova, 42, a certified nursing assistant, came to Charlotte Regional nearly in tears because she had no money and the hospital hadn't had a chance to pay workers on Friday.
"I've got 8 cents in the bank," the Port Charlotte resident said. "I need money. I've got to get groceries and gas and cigarettes. Everything in the refrigerator is ruined."
By the time she left, hospital staff had found her paycheck and a stranger outside gave her $10.
Outside Charlotte Regional, federal and state disaster officials operated a makeshift ER as patients drove up or came by ambulance.
Doctors and emergency technicians worked with limited supplies in the intense heat.
"We need everything," a supervisor who declined to be interviewed said on a cell phone. "Ice. Water. You name it."
As he spoke, a truck drove into the parking lot and its driver told the supervisor, "I've got pharmaceuticals."
"Great."
Linda Williams of Punta Gorda stood watching the activity around her, waiting for doctors to get to her husband, Michael, 65, who was experiencing symptoms of a heart attack.
"My husband's in that ambulance," she said, pointing. "He was busy cleaning up the yard from the hurricane. We were feeling fortunate that we still had a roof over our heads. Now this."
