A Nursing Miracle in Tucson, Az During the Coldest Week in Years

Do you believe in miracles?

I do.

I do not think there is such a thing as coincidence. Everything happens for a reason and for the greater good. One way or the other, even with evil and war and death and illness surrounding us,everything happens in the end for GOOD.

I have a wonderful story to share with all of you about a little old lady who loved her home health nurse so much she listed her as her "friend" at her physicians office; a worried and caring radiology nurse who started searching for her when she failed to show up for her appointment and a service oriented, compassionate home health nurse who did what she knew whas right,despite the cost to her time or her pocketbook.

One of the registered nurses where I work had taken care of this little old lady in the fall of 2010 and had discharged her as her goals were met as far as possible. Since that time the woman had suffered and had been re-hospitialized but when she was discharged home health was NOT re-ordered!

She was about to slip through the cracks!

When she failed to show for her radiation treatments the radiology nurse started her search. The woman had lost her phone so the radilology nurse called the primary care physician. That nurse told her "We have a number for a "friend" why not try it?"

The radiology nurse called the number and my peer answered the phone!

Without having to hear another word my peer immediately went to check on her old patient. It was at the start of the coldest week in Tucson in two decades and every day it just got colder, more pipes burst, more residents went without electricity or gas, even two women found dead of exposure during that infamous week.

My peer found her old patient in a bad state, blankets covering all the windows of her mobile home, the blankets waving with every whiff of wind blowing through the poorly insulated trailer. Her old patient had been given a feeding tube and had cans of tube feeding but could not work the pump so had just been putting water into her stomach since the second week of January. She had electricity but her heater was broken; she had a gas stove and the oven was the only source of heat. My peer's red blinking light that every nurse has inside their head began to flash " DANGER! DANGER!" Of course, she wanted to call 911, of course, her old patient refused; she had a check coming that week. Of course, the fact that she was too weak to make it to her bed, much less to the mailbox or the bank was lost on the patient; nevertheless she would not be swayed; staying in her trailer she was going to stay.

My peer then began her nursing job, called every physician the patient had, told all the specifics, much deeper and sadder with the facts than this nurse will portray on paper, begged for referrals for home health nursing and social services. While the wheels of Medicare turn swift, the wheels of Medicare HMO turn grindingly slowly. The referral for home health was denied. If she had been home all this time and was "all right," why ask for home health now?

I know, it is terrifiyngly real and frustrating and heartbreaking to contemplate.

Did that stop my friend, my peer, my co-worker and fellow nurse?

Not a whit! She went about the task of making sure her old patient was fed, taught her how to do bolus feedings, bought her clothes and blankets and a space heater, with many MANY safety instructions! Refused any monies from myself, glad to do it with a joyful heart and loving hands she saw her old patient first thing every morning and made sure she had everything she needed before she went to her own home every night.

That week of below freezing temperatures is over now for our beloved Sonoran desert, the HMO has had their way for another few days but my peer and I are still fighting to get more help for this lovely old woman who loved my peer so much as her nurse she listed her as her friend.

It is without any doubt that I tell you my peer saved that woman's life. I know there are miracles; every day and it was NO coincidence that this happened at this time, in this fashion, exactly in this way for one purpose and that was to bring my peer to the home of her old patient. To give help, love, nursing instruction and protection.

To take it a step further, at the same time this is happening to her old patient my peer got a phone call from the man who sells them wood for their wood stove. He was "just checking" they were "such good customers" and thought he would see if "they needed more wood."

This was at the very start of the week and my peer and her husband said "Oh sure, why not?" So the wood man brought them a cord of wood "plus a little extra, cause you are such good customers." Who knew that my peer would be one of the many in Tucson that went without power, whose pipes burst and who, without that wood would have spent all week cold, without power, without running water?

And why would that happen to my peer and her family, who could handle it well, and yet, the little old lady, in a drafty trailer without heat would remain safe, warm, fed by the hands of her "friend" her home health nurse?

There are miracles every day.

There is no such thing as coincidence.

Bless you my friend, my peer, my fellow nurse for continuing your craft, your very art of nursing, when even the Medicare HMO says there is NO NEED!

Whatever we put out into the universe returns to us, times three.