How hospital rallied to cope with injured
ON the day of the Omagh bomb renal consultant physician Dr Peter Garrett was coordinating medical officer at Tyrone County Hospital. He described the scenes as "horrifying".
Hospital staff had just completed a planning exercise for a major emergency. Dr Garrett, 55, got the call shortly after 3pm that Saturday, but thought it was another dry-run.
Nurses Paul and Anne Booth, who were friends visiting from England, helped out.
"At the hospital an Ulsterbus coach pulled up outside A&E which seemed unusual. The driver had used the bus to take the injured to hospital," he said.
From initial chaotic scenes with all cubicles filled and injured in outpatients, they quickly discovered there had been a bomb and many were seriously injured or dead.
The coordinating sister opened the ENT ward, to which patients were moved and work began in a quiet professional and ordered way, caring for patients, he recalled.
They dealt with major blast and flesh shrapnel injuries, loss of limbs, and minor perforation injuries, he said.
Many came in the days that followed with ruptured ear drums.
"The enormity of this disaster would have stretched any accident emergency plan, in terms of communication and documentation. The switchboard was jammed. The Army were a huge help, taking time out to communicate with officers," he said.
Patients needed intravenous treatment, tetanus immunisation, anti-biotics or pain relief.
"Part of the reason it was so successful was the disposal plan, for whether patients needed to stay in hospital, or needed surgery, or specialist care at Craigavon or Royal Victoria hospitals. Within the first hour we had all of this working," he said.
Many off-duty staff and GPs turned up to help.
"We had a core of workers in a small hospital who knew each other and worked with each other and that helped."
Since the bomb, Tyrone County Hospital lost its acute and A&E services to the Erne Hospital ahead of building a new acute hospital and a new local hospital at Omagh.
If such an emergency were to recur questions remain over whether Omagh's response would be as successful.
Dr Garrett said it is difficult to see how it could be.
"There have been difficult decisions taken on this site and the range of service is less than it was. This is a decision the department has taken and I'm not in a position to say whether it is right or wrong. Having a well-equipped hospital and professional staff was a critical factor in a successful response," he said.
He said the impact of the atrocity on staff was "enormously traumatic".
"This is a small hospital with close-knit workers and we were able to resolve that, it involved talking and talking about events until you can attach some meaning or until the senselessness turns into reality instead of a dream, and then you can move on," he said.
Lessons were learned around coordination and clinical management and outcomes for those seriously injured or with blood loss who have to travel before they can be seen.
On the anniversary he has good and bad reflections.
"The way the staff worked together was superbly inspiring. That sense of calm, professionalism, efficiency, endures, as well as the damaged limbs and loss of life. Many of the injured have been fantastic in dealing with problems and that is inspiring as well,” he said.
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Weather for Belfast
Monday 28 May 2012
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