University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

Published: May 4, 2006

By KEVIN FRYLING
Reporter Contributor

A student set to graduate next week from the School of Nursing recently passed an exam that none of her classmates, or many health professionals, have ever been asked to take—coming to the aid of a passenger in a real-life, high-stress medical scare during a two-and-a-half-hour airplane ride.

Michelle Henry says her UB training prepared her to handle a medical emergency aboard a recent airplane flight.
PHOTO: NANCY J. PARISI

With a cool head and a UB education, Michelle Henry passed the test—with flying colors.

"We were returning from the greatest vacation," says Henry, a senior nursing student whose fiancé had proposed two days before a spring break cruise to the Bahamas. "We were coming back, excited to tell everyone, and then there was this."

About a half hour into a flight from Miami to Philadelphia, Henry says she noticed a middle-aged woman who seemed ill. After the passenger had spent about 20 minutes in the restroom and failed to respond to inquiries from the flight crew, she was found to have passed out.

The crew revived the woman, but she was suffering from extreme nausea, sweats and slurred speech. She began to fade in and out of consciousness, and before the incident was over, she lost consciousness a second time.

"The stewardess asked if there was a medical doctor on the plane," Henry recalls. "No one stepped forward. She asked if there was an EMT (emergency medical technician). No one. Then she asked if there was a nurse; still no one."

It was at that point that Henry decided to assist. "I was to the point where I was almost a (nursing) graduate. I felt more prepared than the other people," she says.

After Henry used a first-aid kit to check the passenger's vital signs, which were within normal limits, a pharmacist and a nurse came forward to help. But, Henry says, both declined to take the lead.

"I thought at first I could be an extra set of hands, but it turned out the other people were there to assist me," she says.

Henry says that during the past semester she had participated in an in-class simulation on diagnosing an unresponsive patient. "Everyone forgets to ask if the patient is diabetic," she says. "I learned from that mistake." She remembered to ask the other passengers if anyone had a blood-sugar test kit. But the results were normal, she says.

Later, she performed a "sternal rub," an action that can wake patients who seem unconscious. "We just learned about that about two weeks before in school," she says. But the woman did not awaken.

Other tests, such as checking reactions of the pupils with a flashlight, were ones she says she learned during the numerous clinical experiences that are part of a student nurse's training during the junior and senior years. She had been assigned to Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital at the time of the incident, she says.

Meanwhile, a search of the passenger's purse revealed a number of prescription medications, which the pharmacist observed came from different pharmacies. The diagnosis: a suspected drug reaction.

The flight crew put the volunteers in contact via telephone with a doctor from AirMed, who advised them to administer oxygen. Henry says the plane's flight crew and 300 passengers acted as if she was in charge of the situation.

"I was asked to make a decision for everyone on the plane," she says. "The steward came up, grabbed me by the shoulder and said, 'You need to make a decision right now if we need to divert the flight.'"

She told the steward there was no need to do that because the patient was stable. The doctor on the phone then told her to administer an IV of saline solution, as well as an injection of Narcan, which is used to treat overdoses. She says she prepared to take these actions in the cramped space—the patient was lying on three seats in the center of the plane. She says she would have been forced to use a cocktail napkin as gauze and a glove as a tourniquet. But the situation did not come to that because the passenger woke up.

The whole ordeal lasted about an hour, says Henry, noting the woman was given a seat in first-class and received treatment from EMTs at the terminal after the plane landed.

The other passengers applauded when the plane finally landed, she says.

"I wasn't nervous. I felt completely prepared to do whatever I had to do," says Henry, who likened the intense experience to those in a hospital emergency room. She points out that a three-week preceptorship in the emergency room at Erie County Medical Center serves as the final step toward earning a nursing degree at UB.

Henry's actions have earned praise from her instructors in the School of Nursing.

"This is a testament to Michelle's character and level-headed thinking under a very stressful situation," says Laurie Seier, a clinical instructor who taught Henry in the classroom and in the field. "I am extremely proud of her for conducting herself in such a manner."

Henry says she's surprised at the reactions she's received regarding the incident. "It's more than I expected because, I thought, if someone was sick, you help them," she says. "I thought a lot of people would come forward."

Henry, who has served as a nurses' assistant at Roswell Park Cancer Institute for two years, will begin a new position at RPCI in June.