‘Most stressful shift of my career:’ Stranded doctors help mudslide victims at B.C. hospital

When the small hospital in Hope, B.C., found itself suddenly overwhelmed with mudslide victims, other health-care workers trapped in the community stepped up to help.

Doctors who work at Fraser Canyon hospital in Hope, B.C., say they were not equipped to treat the number of injured victims from Sunday night’s mudslides along Highway 7 — but are grateful to the stranded medical professionals who came in to help.

Dr. Stefan Patrascu was the only doctor working at the community’s hospital when the mudslides injured multiple people and left hundreds stranded.

“I was the only E.R. doctor in town and that was probably the most stressful shift of my career thus far,”  Patrascu said.

“We did get some seriously injured victims from one of the mudslides.”

Patrascu only had the assistance of four nurses at the 10-bed facility when search and rescue crews started flying in one patient after the next, he said.

Some of the mudslide victims, including a teenager, had critical injuries.

“Having a very young patient that was critically injured and not being able to transfer them out by land or by air for 24 hours was extremely stressful,” Patrascu said.

In that first 12-hours, while Patrascu the nursing team were trying to treat as many patient as they could, other doctors from outside Hope were trying to make their way into the district to assist.