Hospital bar staff. Sally (2nd left) with the team – Michelle, Sharon, Priya and Denise
Flooding serves up pub-based healthcare Elizabeth Brown | Senior Communications Advisor
H
ospitals don’t normally have pool tables, a jukebox, and a fully stocked bar, but during the record-breaking floods in Westport, doctors and nurses found themselves caring for patients out of the local pub.
On 17 July the Buller River was flowing almost 13 metres above normal – the largest flood flow on any New Zealand river in almost 100 years, according to NIWA. The unprecedented flooding inundated large parts of Westport, leaving hundreds of red and yellow stickered homes in its wake. Formerly a rural hospital, Buller Health is now an integrated family health centre, but still the only place to get emergency health care for miles around. The floodwaters filled the building’s basement, taking out the boiler, affecting electrical systems and spilling sewage. Time to evacuate With a civil defence emergency already declared, the decision was made to evacuate to the only suitable building on higher ground – Club Buller, a community bar and restaurant. 14 THE SPECIALIST | SEPTEMBER 2021
According to Rural Generalist and Emergency Medicine specialist Dr Sally Peet, the health centre was especially busy at the time. With flooding imminent, many households had been evacuated to the local school, but elderly and disabled people were brought to the health centre. So instead of the usual 2–6 inpatients, there were 15. “They tried to send ambulances up from Greymouth to retrieve patients, but they became stuck in the floodwaters and couldn’t go back. The bonus for us was that we had additional paramedics in town, which was invaluable,” Sally says. Evacuating patients out of the floodaffected building was no easy task. Pushing beds along the street was impossible, and with the flooding too much for the ambulances, the Army transferred patients in Unimogs.
Once they reached the club, patients were cared for on mattresses on the floor. “That meant nurses getting down on their hands and knees to roll patients and help them to the toilet etc. One nurse couldn’t get home so stayed and worked for nearly 30 hours. She said her back was terrible by the end.” There were personal challenges for some of the staff as well as they worked through, knowing their own homes were being flooded. Many others wanted to come in and help but simply couldn’t get there. M*A*S*H* in a bar Once all the patients and equipment were transported, Club Buller was quickly transformed into a makeshift hospital. Dr Peet says fortunately none of the patients who had been evacuated was too sick. A few were able to be taken to
