Published: October 11, 2008 08:28 pm            

Guest Commentary - Dr. Joe Saucedo

A commentary on our giving spirit

I would like it to be known that Corsicana has great people living here. I “rode out” Hurricane Ike in Dallas at a function. On Monday I was called to see if I could help at the evacuee site. I have to say that I was and still am very impressed with our response. Emily Carroll with the Health Department was doing a fantastic job coordinating the Cornerstone Baptist Church’s site that housed the evacuees. Trena Weidmann-P&S Pharmacy (one of the ones that called me to see if I could help out) was busier than ever trying to get medicines to the people who some said only were given about 15 minutes to pack up. Just verifying some of these meds when the pharmacies and doctor’s offices are closed/possibly destroyed is a task that I can only imagine tackling. Terry Allen-nurse (the other person that called me to help) spent endless hours helping with some more difficult evacuees (we had a lot of health related surprises — that is complicated health issues). The Red Cross was also present and only had great things to say about the response. I believe the Red Cross had just made arrangements to transfer 15 or so evacuees to Ennis and Waxahachie to nursing homes or higher level of care sites the night I was there to help out which was great for all involved.

I started to coordinate with Xavier Villarreal-Navarro Regional Hospital to help some of the doctors to volunteer at the center as well. Drs. John Updegrove, Bill Lee, and Howard Katz (and his wife Wendy-nurse) had already helped in some ways over that weekend. Emily Carroll came to talk to our medical staff meeting and Dr. Dale Campbell was scheduled to work the next day.

Emily even stated the local beauty college had the evacuees come over to be “beautified.” The YMCA made themselves available as well.

I’m sure that I left out a lot of people that deserve recognition as I only saw a small part of this. And I’m also sure that Dr. Kent Rogers, who was away, would have had a big hand in this and it’s been his leadership in the past that has prepared us for events such as this.

The evacuees are now gone and we’ve learned a lot from this experience. And again I must say we have great people living here.

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Submitted by Dr. Joe Saucedo

Navarro Regional Hospital chief of staff

        

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