UO Magazine > NEW ORLEANS Community Profile

Out of the Storm

New Orleans faces challenges that would make any city shudder. But the city’s residents are a special breed, determined to restore their unique community

By Susan Sarver

Unique Opportunities May/June 2007

It’s a brilliant, sunny day in February. Palms sway in the balmy breeze and the blooming tulip trees cast rippling shadows. The distant drumbeat of a marching band and the aroma of funnel cakes signal a parade is about to begin. Families gather along stately St. Charles Avenue. Children wave to masked float riders as purple, gold, and green Mardi Gras beads fly through the air. New Orleans might have been

beaten by a hurricane, drowned by its lake, and humbled by its own dysfunction, but it still knows how to party.

Hurricane Katrina slammed into the city on August 29, 2005, and with the subsequent breach of the levees, New Orleans changed forever. This old port city, rich in history and culture, whose political tales and troubles sometimes sound fantastic enough to be fiction, continues to recover from the largest natural disaster in the history of the U.S. Not an easy task, particularly under the watchful eyes of the entire world.

Some aspects of the city’s rehabilitation

haven’t progressed as swiftly as hoped. Current population estimates run as low as 40 percent of pre-Katrina numbers; the Road Home program has been criticized as confusing and ineffective; numerous destroyed homes remain untouched; and some of the most devastated areas have been further troubled by a surge in crime. Factor in the overarching theme—what’s true today in New Orleans might not be true tomorrow—and it all makes for significant challenges.

However, there is plenty of good news coming out of New Orleans, too. Determined natives and newcomers (French Quarter residents Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt among the latter), along with a steady stream of committed volunteers from all across the country, and the ardent keeping of traditions like Mardi Gras have helped sustain the city’s unquenchable spirit.

In fact, much of New Orleans looks like its old self, just with a bit of a facelift. The Superdome has been restored. Renowned restaurants have reopened; the beloved Camellia Grill has been persuaded by a window filled with “Post-it” love notes to make a comeback. Magazine Street is brimming with boutiques and antiques. The Aquarium gleams in the sunlight. Pristine Audubon Park looks as if nothing more than a breeze rippled its stream. The Cajun Queen and the Creole Queen stand ready for a pleasure paddle down the mighty Mississippi River. The French Quarter is alive with its usual array of quirky characters and strolling tourists; music echoes along Bourbon Street and coffee shops are filled with people telling and retelling their stories. It’s this side of New Orleans that is often missed by the media.

“This is just like a barn-building for Americans,” says Patrick Quinlan, MD, the CEO of Ochsner Health System. While the nation saw plenty of negative events after the hurricane, says Quinlan, “what you didn’t see was the 99 percent of the people who went way out of their way to help somebody else, even at great risk and great cost to themselves.”

In the thick of the Katrina crisis, the medical profession produced many of the quiet heroes of the storm. In the weeks that followed, physicians and other workers delivered health care from tents in parking lots, in a vacated department store, and even in a mosque. Health care continues to be a critical force in the rebuilding of New Orleans. Working here comes with a unique perk—the chance to help breathe new life into one of the most fascinating cities in the world.

Needs and opportunities

“I’d say that practicing in New Orleans right now is not for the faint of heart but, for the right person, I think it’s a really good opportunity,” says Tyler Curiel, MD, MPH, the director of the San Antonio Cancer Institute and an adjunct professor of medicine at Tulane University School of Medicine. His co-authored article on health care in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina and his perspective piece on the need for disaster training appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine. Considered one of the heroes of Hurricane Katrina, Curiel stayed throughout the storm, caring for patients at both Tulane University Hospital and Clinic and Charity Hospital, then helped to evacuate patients, carrying many of them through dark, hot stairwells to reach rescue helicopters. Afterward, he retrieved precious cancer research cells and samples and transported them safely to other facilities.

“For the person who ever thought they may want to try an academic setting but didn’t really want all the pressure of writing grants, ...right now would be an excellent time to look at Tulane or LSU because they need good clinical staff and everyone understands now that you can’t be writing big grants.... It’s really more about building the clinical practice, teaching the students, and teaching the residents,” says Curiel.

While Curiel believes it’s a difficult time in New Orleans for solo practitioners in almost any discipline, group practices that have a good handle on the needs of the local population present opportunities, particularly for specialties that are in demand. According to Curiel, there are needs in family medicine, general internal medicine, and subspecialties such as cardiology and diabetology. He cautions that with fewer school-age children in the city, pediatricians should look very carefully at the impact on pediatric practices in New Orleans.

“Probably the biggest specialty that is very far underrepresented and very much needed are people who have very good psychiatry skills and psychology skills,” says Curiel. He adds that there is a lot of depression, post-traumatic stress, and anxiety in the entire population that cuts across all ages and socioeconomic groups.

In a February 14, 2007 article in The Times-Picayune, Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center announced plans to open a psychiatric hospital in Uptown New Orleans by summer 2007 to help relieve a critical shortage of inpatient mental health services. The dearth has shifted the burden to area emergency rooms that are seeing numerous patients in need of mental health services. Currently, acute psychiatric facilities in the city include the 35-bed New Orleans Adolescent Hospital and Kindred Hospital for elderly patients. In Harahan, a suburb of New Orleans, River Oaks Hospital is licensed for 100 inpatients, including units for children, adolescents, and adults.

Regrouping

The flooding following the levee breaches re-defined the importance of location. Uptown hospitals, including Touro Infirmary and Children’s Hospital, escaped flooding and reopened relatively quickly. However, downtown hospitals were particularly hard hit. Charity Hospital suffered severe damages and remains closed, but the massive facility that long provided care for indigent patients will live on in the minds of many physicians who trained there. Charity was the site of the “Bullpen,” a steep amphitheater where medical students were drilled so fiercely some fainted from fear.

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