Books Set in the United States: New Orleans, Louisiana

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital, by Sheri Fink (2013)

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital is one of the best books I have read about Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath in one of the New Orleans Hospitals.  It describes not only the events that took place at Baptist Memorial Hospital in the five days following Hurricane Katrina, but also provides some history of the hospital and medical disasters in general.  The hospital had not effective triage system to care for critically ill patients, hence, they were last on the list for evacuation.  Were some of these patients euthanized before the hospital was finally evacuated?

This book explores the issues, both legal and political, regarding the treatment of patients and the medical staff in the handling of patients during such a this hurricane disaster.  The first part of this book describes the five days surrounding Hurricane Katrina, from August 28 through September 1, 2015 when the hospital was operating under disastrous conditions ~ the hospital had lost power, its back-up generators were inadequate, and the lower floors became flooded.  Evacuation of patients took a long time, and decisions were made to evacuate the most ambulatory patients first.  Critically ill patients were given morphine, ostensibly to provide them with comfort to ease their pain, but were these injections lethal doses designed to hasten the death of patients the medical staff could not survive?

The second part of the book focuses on the legal and political aspects of the hospital’s response to the hurricane disaster.  The hospital was run by an out-of-state health care company that seemed to have little understanding of what was actually occurring in New Orleans following Katrina.  Some of the medical staff were horrified to think that some patients were deliberately euthanized.  As a result, the Louisiana Attorney General initiated an investigation, which focused on Dr. Anna Pou and two intensive care nurses.  Charges were ultimately dropped.  The questions, however, persist.

I found this book to be very well written and felt the author provided a balanced view one whether or not these critically patients were euthanized.  The author’s well researched investigation provides the reader with sufficient evidence to allow the reader to decide whether or not the patients were euthanized.

5 Stars

Read: May 15, 2016