Edith Allwood-Anderson (left), president of the Nurses' Association of Jamaica (NAJ), chats with John Junor, former Minister of Health, during the NAJ 60th anniversary celebrations and 49th annual Summer School Seminar at the Hilton Kingston hotel, yesterday. The event was held to celebrate Nurses' Week. - RICARDO MAKYN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
PRESIDENT OF the Nurses' Association of Jamaica (NAJ), Edith Allwood-Anderson, has charged the Government to install sufficient power generators after hospitals struggled to protect patients on life support during an islandwide blackout on the weekend.
Mrs. Allwood-Anderson's call came in light of a report from a nurse at the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH) that patients in the critical care unit had to be 'bagged' (manually ventilated) for hours during Saturday's power outage.
"An electrical plant is a must in this area. We need to understand that these are priority areas, and in an intensive unit, like KPH, a major hospital, and Bustamante Children's Hospital, we need to look at them," she told The Gleaner during the NAJ's 49th annual Summer School Seminar at the Hilton Kingston hotel, yesterday.
BACK-UP SYSTEM
The NAJ head said the lack of a back-up system to ensure the continuity of proper care needs to be addressed urgently.
"Hospitals were in darkness and nurses had to be scrambling in the dark to look for a Home Sweet Home lamp or a flashlight to care for patients. These things need to be looked at!" she stressed.
Mrs. Allwood-Anderson con-tends that, while the nursing profession has undergone significant development in the past 60 years, the caregivers are still facing the same struggles their predecessors faced in 1946.
She argued that simple things such as oil to sterilise medical instruments and the lack of air conditioning units frustrated hospital care.
When contacted, KPH Chief Executive Officer, Donald Farquharson, told The Gleaner that he was unaware of patients being "bagged" for hours.
MANUALLY VENTILATED
He revealed, however, that checks indicated during a three-to-five-minute period after the power outage, patients had to be manually ventilated until the back-up system kicked in.
Senior medical officer at KPH, Dr. Trevor McCartney, also noted that he was unaware of nurses having to manually ventilate patients as he had received no complaints. He said the back-up system at the hospital was insufficient as it was only able to serve 70 per cent of the facility.
