Best Hospitals 2007
Grace Under Fire
The Fourth, says surgeon Rob Sheridan, was "surprisingly quiet" at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he is codirector of the adult burn service. No macho dad had a bottle rocket or gasoline-juiced hot coals blow up in his face over the holiday weekend. Nor was it busy down the street at the Shrine, as Bostonians call Shriners Burns Hospital, where kids are treated free and where Sheridan also is medical director of burn surgery.
But plenty of other days, the intensive care units in both hospitals are packed with young and old, rushed in with skin boiled to tatters from a spilled pot of pasta or charred solid from falling into a bonfire. The burn teams assess the damage and insert a breathing tube if necessary. They look for a place to start an IV, because fluid is rapidly leaking out of the blood vessels into the body's soft tissues--a 150-pound adult will need at least 3 1/2 gallons a day pumped in to compensate. Heavy pain medication is started. "You want them to be comfortable and safe," says Sheridan. "You want your staff to be comfortable--no one likes to see patients writhing in pain."
Over the next five days or so, burned tissue is cut away and the wounds closed with temporary grafts or artificial wraps. Sealing off the damage is relatively new. It has slashed the deadly infections that can easily kill patients whose defenses are already weak. Then comes the complex job of grafting and repair. A child who is burned over 80 percent of his body will live here for weeks.
Is it surprising that those who care for burn patients tend not to talk about it with outsiders? But most are passionate about their work--and whom they work with. "We've shared a lot of horrendous moments," says Colleen Ryan, Sheridan's codirector, "and we've become very close."
This story appears in the July 17, 2006 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.
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