quinn Duke, Larry Nelson, Rosemarie
Robledo, Patrick Greiffenstein and Jeremy
Timmer; Physician Assistant Jennifer Esquinance; and Nurse Practitioners Aaron
Bateman, Jodee Bernier and Ellen Wilson.
North Oaks Certified Programs Director
Katie Sheets and Trauma Manager Tyler
Brignac provide leadership for the trauma
center and are assisted by trauma registrars
and a program assistant.
A Shock Trauma Clinic offers follow-up
care to patients after they are discharged
from the hospital to help them regain as
much “pre-trauma” quality of life as possible.
A year ago, 51-year-old Willie Nichols
of Hammond was brought to the trauma
30
center after a gunshot wounded him in the
abdomen, kidneys and stomach. He spent
59 days at North Oaks receiving treatment.
“I felt like it was over for me but I was encouraged by the doctors and nurses here,”
Nichols recalls. “With the doctors’ help, I’m
back doing the things I enjoyed doing.”
He was so appreciative of the trauma
team’s efforts that he presented them each
with plaques that read, “In recognition of
doing an outstanding job and saving my
life.”
In another act of gratitude, he had pizzas delivered to all the nurses who helped
care for him.
“They really deserved more than that,”
Nichols adds. “I believe God worked
through them in saving my life. If it wasn’t
for them, I wouldn’t be sitting here today.”
North Oaks is already seeing a 50 percent
decrease in trauma patients who are transferred out of the region to receive care. In
2014, the North Oaks Shock Trauma team
responded to 411 trauma activations and
to 793 in 2015. In the first five months of
2016, the activations hit 396. Combined,
this is a total of 1,600 lives that have been
touched.
To learn more about the North Oaks
Shock Trauma Center, call the North Oaks
Public Relations Department at (985) 2306647 or visit www.northoaks.org/trauma.