Nurse Under Ebola Quarantine Criticizes Her Treatment

What do you think?

I do not think her minor "inconvenience" is more important than possibly infecting others with a deadly disease. Especially after that last idiot Doctor in New York decided to run all over the city even when he knew he wasn't feeling well and of course the other nurse who decided to freeking take an airline when she knew she had a fever.

Sorry, Public Safety trumps your inconvenience in my opinion.

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I am a nurse who has just returned to the U.S. after working with Doctors Without Borders in Sierra Leone - an Ebola-affected country. I have been quarantined in New Jersey. This is not a situation I would wish on anyone, and I am scared for those who will follow me. I am scared about how health care workers will be treated at airports when they declare that they have been fighting Ebola in West Africa. I am scared that, like me, they will arrive and see a frenzy of disorganization, fear and, most frightening, quarantine. I arrived at the Newark Liberty International Airport around 1 p.m. on Friday, after a grueling two-day journey from Sierra Leone. I walked up to the immigration official at the airport and was greeted with a big smile and a “hello.” I told him that I have traveled from Sierra Leone and he replied, a little less enthusiastically: “No problem. They are probably going to ask you a few questions.” He put on gloves and a mask and called someone. Then he escorted me to the quarantine office a few yards away. I was told to sit down. Everyone that came out of the offices was hurrying from room to room in white protective coveralls, gloves, masks, and a disposable face shield. One after another, people asked me questions. Some introduced themselves, some didn’t. One man who must have been an immigration officer because he was wearing a weapon belt that I could see protruding from his white coveralls barked questions at me as if I was a criminal. Two other officials asked about my work in Sierra Leone. One of them was from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They scribbled notes in the margins of their form, a form that appeared to be inadequate for the many details they are collecting. I was tired, hungry and confused, but I tried to remain calm. My temperature was taken using a forehead scanner and it read a temperature of 98. I was feeling physically healthy but emotionally exhausted. Three hours passed. No one seemed to be in charge. No one would tell me what was going on or what would happen to me. I called my family to let them know that I was OK. I was hungry and thirsty and asked for something to eat and drink. I was given a granola bar and some water. I wondered what I had done wrong. Four hours after I landed at the airport, an official approached me with a forehead scanner. My cheeks were flushed, I was upset at being held with no explanation. The scanner recorded my temperature as 101. The female officer looked smug. “You have a fever now,” she said. I explained that an oral thermometer would be more accurate and that the forehead scanner was recording an elevated temperature because I was flushed and upset. I was left alone in the room for another three hours. At around 7 p.m., I was told that I must go to a local hospital. I asked for the name and address of the facility. I realized that information was only shared with me if I asked. Eight police cars escorted me to the University Hospital in Newark. Sirens blared, lights flashed. Again, I wondered what I had done wrong. I had spent a month watching children die, alone. I had witnessed human tragedy unfold before my eyes. I had tried to help when much of the world has looked on and done nothing. At the hospital, I was escorted to a tent that sat outside of the building. The infectious disease and emergency department doctors took my temperature and other vitals and looked puzzled. “Your temperature is 98.6,” they said. “You don't have a fever but we were told you had a fever.” After my temperature was recorded as 98.6 on the oral thermometer, the doctor decided to see what the forehead scanner records. It read 101. The doctor felts my neck and looked at the temperature again. “There’s no way you have a fever,” he said. “Your face is just flushed.” My blood was taken and tested for Ebola. It came back negative. I sat alone in the isolation tent and thought of many colleagues who will return home to America and face the same ordeal. Will they be made to feel like criminals and prisoners? I recalled my last night at the Ebola management center in Sierra Leone. I was called in at midnight because a 10-year-old girl was having seizures. I coaxed crushed tablets of Tylenol and an anti-seizure medicine into her mouth as her body jolted in the bed. It was the hardest night of my life. I watched a young girl die in a tent, away from her family. With few resources and no treatment for Ebola, we tried to offer our patients dignity and humanity in the face of their immense suffering. The epidemic continues to ravage West Africa. Recently, the World Health Organization announced that as many as 15,000 people have died from Ebola. We need more health care workers to help fight the epidemic in West Africa. The U.S. must treat returning health care workers with dignity and humanity.

a reply to: infolurker

I do not think her minor "inconvenience"

Is that what you call it!

7 hours sitting in a room with one little bar and some water.

Ineptitude surrounding her.

Give me a break.

Multiple people asking questions.

No organization, no care for her.

They decide (erroneously) that she has a fever ..... and did nothing.

OP, I get your scared.

How about the Authorities act with a little dignity, compassion and care.

7 hours sitting in a room with air conditioning feeding the airport. Yea right, they really know how to handle this don't they.

And the great and mighty CDC have her in a bloody tent. I would be pissed too at this treatment.

P

I think the nurse should have enough consideration for her fellow human beings to reach down within herself and find some compassion for people put in a very new and difficult position. Perhaps she can use the next three weeks to reflect on her reaction to a perfectly rational response by agencies of government.
Her rant does nothing to improve the image of health care workers. At this point, the average American who is following this story is left with mouth agape that health care professionals behave in such reckless fashion as to cause undue anxiety to thousands of people.
I'm not saying that she is one who would behave irresponsibly, I'm sure she was planning to "self-quarantine" for the next three weeks. The people dealing with her were in a brand new situation, under brand new orders.

a reply to: infolurker

I think she should whining.........wha.......wha.....wha. She made a choice and now she should live with it. How's that for dignity and humanity. I am wondering how much help someone this stupid could really be over in Africa.

I wouldn't go treat Ebola...

Crude, but real.

Her treatment atm? Lucky she is alive in all reality, people have forgotten what it is like to have a genuinely deadly disease ravaging about... there is no making this pretty.

This is beyond me. Who exactly is going over there, that is supposedly a trained professional, that takes issue with being isolated when returning from an epidemic stricken area?

I cant wait for a year or two to pass after things get cleared up to hear from the people that stayed in Africa to see this through and understand the nature of epidemics, to tell us of what these people coming and going actually did while there for a couple weeks.

This is just retarded.

Who are these people?

What a drama queen. What did she think was going to happen? Could potentially happen?

A month seems like a small sacrifice in making sure people stay safe, especially considering the much larger one she chose to make in going over there to help some.

With luck they will get more organized and make it better for the people to follow her.

And you know what?

Maybe, being the kind of person who likes to help and notices things, just maybe she could spend her time in quarantine helping that happen

ETA: She works with MSF/DWB, who are VERY against this quarantine and have been very outspoken against this NJ/NY protocol, or any protocol that inconveniences their staff, since the beginning, so take her "noise" with a grain.

a reply to: diggindirt

So its punishment. I think medical staff are far more responsible than your normal citizen. I'm sure they can be allowed to self-monitor responsibly. It is like being punished to help. Counter-intuitive.



You may see a reduction in people going to help in West Africa if they are going to be punished when they get home.

The real problem is everybody else.

People only have so much alturism.

originally posted by: ispyed
a reply to: diggindirt

So its punishment. I think medical staff are far more responsible than your normal citizen. I'm sure they can be allowed to self-monitor responsibly. It is like being punished to help. Counter-intuitive.



You may see a reduction in people going to help in West Africa if they are going to be punished when they get home.

The real problem is everybody else.

People only have so much alturism.

What?

Have you been keeping up with the news? These professionals are being idiots.

Hey, I may have been exposed to ebola, I know, instead of "self monitoring" and staying put, I think I will go all over town (even when I feel like I am coming down with something) and oh, maybe I will get on a plane to visit my family when I KNOW I have a fever?

Yeah....

Not.

originally posted by: SubTruth
a reply to: infolurker

I think she should whining.........wha.......wha.....wha. She made a choice and now she should live with it. How's that for dignity and humanity. I am wondering how much help someone this stupid could really be over in Africa.

She goes to another country to help the sick and the needy, something you did not do.

And all you can do is sit in armchair judgement.

I will tell you this, she has more compassion that most.

I expect the US to react with professionalism, is that not what the CDC is about.

There real first test and they are acting like they are fresh from kindergarten.

P

originally posted by: ispyed
a reply to: diggindirt

So its punishment. I think medical staff are far more responsible than your normal citizen. I'm sure they can be allowed to self-monitor responsibly. It is like being punished to help. Counter-intuitive.



You may see a reduction in people going to help in West Africa if they are going to be punished when they get home.

The real problem is everybody else.

People only have so much alturism.

So they should not be have to follow procedure because they went to medical or nursing school.......Really. I have to wonder how common sense can be so vacant sometimes. I also wonder how many of these so called more responsible people make mistakes each year hurting patients.

a reply to: ispyed

As, I believe Governor Christie said, voluntary quarantine is an oxymoron.

Healthcare workers might even possibly be the WORST ones to self-monitor and treat and think they know best. And in the end they're still human too. Their track record in the U.S. so far hasn't been so great.

a reply to: infolurker

Not for nothing, but I heard it said before that places where aid workers were kicked out seemed to recover. They thought they were getting them sick. LOL

Honestly, if they dont see the logic in this isolation, maybe they WERE getting them sick. If they cant sit and wait for under a month, you think they changed suits 2-3 times while treating patients like they are supposed to, had a buddy help them take their gear off, sterilized things and kept on top of cross contamination guidelines? Wore gloves even?

a reply to: pheonix358

It is not a judgment it is a fact......I did not make the rules. The rules are in place for a very good reason and if they had not put them in place posters like you would be complaining they did nothing.


She is whining about something she should not be whining about. If she is so trained she should know better........Right. Also you mention she has more compassion than the common man.......Come on you know her personally. If you do not know her then you are putting personal truth forward as fact.

a reply to: SubTruth
Yep. And I'm also going to go there and say this: If she didn't see this as a possibility, and thinks whining about this instead of continuing in her helpful, altruistic way to help, how smart is she to begin with?

She's a mouthpiece and being encourage to make noise. Boohoo.

originally posted by: ~Lucidity
a reply to: SubTruth
Yep. And I'm also going to go there and say this: If she didn't see this as a possibility, and thinks whining about this instead of continuing in her helpful, altruistic way to help, how smart is she to begin with?

She's a mouthpiece and being encourage to make noise. Boohoo.

Bingo give this man a cigar. But this poor,compassionate,helpful,selfless nurse should not have to follow rules because she is just so gosh darn nice Ebola could never infect her.


I am kinda shocked to see so many posters not able to see things in a clear way. I guess it is a sign of the times.

I would be pissed if she was not quarantined. She really can't understand why? Disgusting.

originally posted by: ispyed
a reply to: diggindirt

So its punishment. I think medical staff are far more responsible than your normal citizen. I'm sure they can be allowed to self-monitor responsibly. It is like being punished to help. Counter-intuitive.



You may see a reduction in people going to help in West Africa if they are going to be punished when they get home.

The real problem is everybody else.

People only have so much alturism.

Working in a hospital the very worst patients are medical staff. Doctors and nurses are terrible patients and would be at the bottom of my list of those I'd let self monitor. (generally speaking)

a reply to: infolurker

It's unfortunate that the officials at the airport weren't better prepared to deal with this situation. At the very least, they could have provided her with courtesy, explanations, and more than a granola bar. THat said, she should have expected to be quarantined. In fact, the quarantines should take place before these people board planes not after they deplane.

It's heroic to volunteer to do the work she did but that doesn't trump common sense.

a reply to: Tangerine

She was the very first one caught up in the brand new protocol. A few bumps in the road are to be expected. Things will get better and she can help them do that.

I say it's a better thing that at least they 1.) made a decision and 2.) acted fast once they made that decision.