Emergency teams assist nurses with problem cases

When North Fort Myers resident Betty Nickel needed a blood transfusion following knee replacement surgery a few weeks back, Lee Memorial Hospital's Medical Emergency Team was called in.

Lee Memorial Health System has the teams in place at Cape Coral Hospital, Lee Memorial Hospital, HealthPark Medical Center and at Gulf Coast Hospital, and officials say that it is reducing the number of patients that are going into cardiac arrest on the floor.

"It's made a big difference in the treatment of patients," said Dr. Razak Dosani, a member of emergency team at Lee Memorial and Cape Coral Hospitals.

The Medical Emergency Team is available 24 hours a day in case a floor nurse has a question or a concern about a patient.

"A nurse is taking care of multiple patients," said Dr. Marilyn Kole, MET medical director for Lee Memorial Health System's intensive care units. She said that if something just doesn't seem right with a patient, while the nurse may not know what is off, the team takes a closer look.

Dr. Dosani said prior to the implementation of the MET program, nurses may or may not have called a doctor just on a feeling that something was off but now there is a resource in place that supports asking for additional assistance.

"There was plenty of data that showed that patients who ended up in cardiac arrest had warning signs several hours before the event," said Dr. Kole. "This doesn't replace the floor nurse, but mentors the floor nurse. A lot of this is supporting the nursing staff."

It's also been beneficial for patients, according to Dr. Kole. She said that those patients who go into cardiac arrest at LMHS are for the most part the sickest ones and already in the intensive care unit.

"Now, people are not having serious problems on the floor," said Dr. Dosani. "We're quickly taking care of them and transferring them to the appropriate setting when they are being watched carefully."

Mrs. Nickel said her experience with the MET program was wonderful.

"They took me downstairs and did a lot of work with machines," she said. "They were a bunch of nice ladies. They came up and were able to find out what was wrong with me.