posted on August 13, 2008

Nurse 'abandoned' family in crisis

Home-care aide fled, left blind dad, mom alone to move disabled girl, 13, from the danger zone

AARON VINCENT ELKAIM/TORONTO STAR
J.P. Pampena, who is blind, says he's shocked a home-care worker fled
during the Aug. 10, 2008 emergency instead of helping move his
disabled daughter (in photo at left) to safety.

By: Megan Ogilvie
Published: August 13, 2008
Source: The Star

Moments after a crushing boom cracked the night, J.P. Pampena called out to his daughter's nurse for help.

Pampena, who is blind, was desperate to know what it was that rattled his house. He needed another set of eyes to search the darkness for the source of the ominous sound, to tell him whether or not to flee with his family or to hide.

"What keeps re-running in my mind is the sound," said Pampena, 52, who has lived with his wife and daughter, who is severely disabled, in the snug bungalow on Katherine Rd. for 21 years, just blocks from Sunrise Propane Industrial Gases.

"Every time an impact took place, it just sounded like it was going through your whole body. Those explosions were so powerful that it felt like the whole earth was shattering, like it was totally being blown to oblivion."

Pampena dashed into the hall, while his wife went to check on their daughter, Nicole. The 13-year-old has cerebral palsy and is unable to walk, talk or feed herself. She relies on machines to help her breathe and requires around-the-clock care.

Already at the front door, the nurse looked outside and called out to Pampena "She said, `Oh my god, there's a gas line leak. All of the houses are exploding.'"

Pampena said he knew then that he had only minutes to get his family out of the house. He pleaded for the nurse to come back inside to help get Nicole out of bed and into her wheelchair.

"She did come back into the house," Pampena recalled. "She ran into Nicole's room, got her purse, got her belongings and ran by me again. She dropped Nicole's suction machine into my hands and said, `This is dangerous. I gotta get out of here. I don't want to die.'

"Then I heard the front door close. I heard her car start and her really peddle it out, like squealing the tires backwards. And she split."

Pampena said he raced out to the porch to call the nurse back. He could not see what was shaking his neighbourhood. He said he was terrified for him, for his wife, for his daughter.

"It felt like the heat was an inch away from my face," he said. "There were more blasts. Here I am, blind, and believing every home on the street is exploding one by one."

Never, Pampena said, did he think the nurse in charge of his daughter's welfare would abandon them in an emergency.

It was, he said, more shocking even than the explosion itself.

"Being here, right in the warzone, I tell you, man ... I can understand the nurse being afraid for her life," Pampena said. "But you know what, so was everybody else. You can't just leave a child."

The Pampenas rely on full-time nurses to help care for their daughter. Pampena runs a public relations company, JP Public Relations, Inc., from his home and is unable to care for Nicole since he is blind. His wife works two days a week. Often the same set of nurses come into the home, but the family's regular contingent are away on holidays.

The Central Community Care Access Centre, the government-funded agency that co-ordinates health services for homecare, arranged for an agency to send a new nurse to help for the weekend. Saturday was her second night with the family.

Colin Sutherland, acting executive director of the access centre, said he could not comment on the case, citing privacy and confidentiality guidelines. But he pointed out nursing is a regulated profession.

"If a nurse is tending to a client, they have duty of care," he said. "The normal expectation would not be that they would abandon the client."

Sutherland said the centre's nursing agencies all have emergency and disaster plans, though they may not outline specific guidelines for how to deal with explosions.

The access centre had 720 clients in the evacuation area, he said.

"And this is the only incident or occurrence that I have heard of related to (Sunday). That doesn't mean it's okay, but I wanted to give you that bit of context."

Pampena said the nursing agency apologized and he was told the nurse was dismissed. The agency declined to speak with the Star.

Paulette Pampena said her daughter's life was put in jeopardy when the nurse drove away early Sunday.

There was not enough time – or enough arms – to carry out Nicole's medication and specialized equipment, including the feed for her feeding tube, she said.

Together, the Pampenas were able to get Nicole into her wheelchair, manouevre it down the darkened staircase and out on to the street.

Once they got to safety, they asked emergency officials to go back to get their wheelchair-accessible van so they could take Nicole to hospital. She is now being cared for at Bloorview Kids Rehab.

The hospital declined to comment.