Read Online Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital by Sheri Fink - Free Book Online

many teaching hospitals, something of a trade was involved. The patients, often poor, received care regardless of their ability to pay. In exchange, budding doctors learned their craft by practicing on them. The hospital served a prison population as well. It seemed like a good fit for Pou, who enjoyed teaching and had a passion for treating the poor, as her father had done.
    The year after Pou was hired,the hospital began to ration care for people who couldn’t afford to pay for it. UTMB faced an $80 million budget deficit and declining state support. Just over a quarter of its patients were uninsured, and many others had inadequate coverage. Now each one was financially screened and charged an entry fee before being allowed to see a doctor. Those who couldn’t pay, or who already owed the hospital money, could be turned away. Exceptions were made for children and patients in emergencies, as required by law. Nearly everyone else was at the mercy of a committee of doctors and administrators tasked with choosing who would and who wouldn’t get care. Committee members were allotted $25,000 each month and had to decide which impecunious patients would receive drugs, surgeries, or other treatments, much as Louis Bristow, decades earlier at Southern Baptist Hospital, had decided which of his supplicants would receive charity care.
    The complex cancer surgeries Pou had spent years learning to perform were expensive. Each patient’s recovery relied on far more than her own skills and efforts. A team of professionals from more than a half dozen other medical disciplines, from radiation therapy to rehabilitation, often needed to be involved. Finding the resources to care for these patients when they lacked health insurance was difficult. Pou vented about her predicament in phone calls with friends. “This is the worst!” she’d begin, pouring her frustration into entertaining tales of woe. “I’ve never had a day like this!” Friends could never be sure which was thetruly worst day of Pou’s life. Those less fond of her found her overdramatic and hyperbolic—too quick to blame others when something went wrong with a patient, as in Dr. So-and-So didn’t care enough or didn’t do a good enough job. Small problems turned into bigger problems. Pou was not always willing to step back and allow other specialists to do their work, and some of them viewed her as controlling.
    That drive to be the one on the team always doing her best, however, made her into a strong patient advocate. She was soon promoted to director of the Division of Head and Neck Surgery in her department. She made great friendships in Galveston, but her work came first. Almost two years after she moved into her house, Pou invited colleagues for a visit. She switched on the oven. The house filled with smoke. The packing materials were still inside.
    Another time, when a surgeon’s wife asked Pou to help out with Junior League, Pou accepted, despite her packed schedule. The surgeon’s wife asked her to print off labels for a large event mailing. “My grandmother would roll over in her grave,” Pou said. Invitations were hand lettered in New Orleans. The surgeon’s wife reminded her she was in Texas now. It didn’t matter. Pou used her spare free time at night to address the envelopes one by one.
    Pou was a lady. She might spend her days in surgical scrubs, but she made it a point to find a favorite Texas hairdresser. Raoul coaxed her straight cinnamon locks into a proper hairdo. On the occasions she had to dress up, Pou tempered New Orleans exuberance with a classic uptown finish, pairing pearls with plunging necklines that flattered her figure.
    During those years in Texas, Pou’s father died, leaving her mother a widow in New Orleans. The beloved chairman of Pou’s department stepped down. He had been an innovator in the field and had mentored Pou and taken great interest in her career. A new chairman was promoted from within the department. He was