Nurse Pauline Reneau had just clocked out of work yesterday evening when she heard someone on a city bus calling for her. As it turns out, a man was unresponsive on one of the seats, and nobody knew how to help. She was in the right place at the right time to try and help the passenger reach a hospital, though he unfortunately didn't make it.
Still, his family was grateful to Nurse Reneau for her assistance. Today we spoke to her about what transpired. Courtney Menzies has this story.
There was chaos on a city bus yesterday evening on Albert Street after those inside realized that one of the passengers was unconscious. At the same time, Nurse Pauline Reneau was heading to pick up her child when someone on the bus noticed her scrubs and called her to help.
Pauline Reneau, Nurse
"When I went on the bus, they said that the man passed out, so I went ahead and I checked for responsiveness and he wasn't responding. I checked for his pulse, there was no pulse there, so I immediately ran out of the bus and I flagged down the first vehicle I saw there and I asked this lady, she can assist me, let's take this man to Karl Heusner because they said that he passed out, I have no idea how long the bus was there, I have no idea how long he had passed out, but I really just wanted to help, so I went into the bus back and I asked for help, for them to help me lift the man so that we can take him into the vehicle, but I guess most of them were freaking out for the most part, they didn't know what to do and some of them didn't want to touch him."
"Upon putting him in the vehicle, I noticed that there was police on patrol, they normally have them at the Hindu shop right there on Albert Street, so they were passing same time and I asked for assistance because it's 5:30, you know, traffic and checkpoint and that time we wouldn't reach at KHMH as soon as possible and I was trying my best to get him there to see if we can save him."
"The police said yes, they will assist us and he drove in front of the vehicle and we followed them and we took the patient there to KHMH."
And though she did all she could, the man - whom she only knows as Charles - had already passed away from a fatal heart attack.
But though she was unable to find a pulse, she said that she knew she had to do something.
Pauline Reneau, Nurse
"The first thing was I wanted to save him, I was hoping that he was just unconscious or he just passed out or something like that and maybe I could have did the CPR, the full three, but I wouldn't say impossible, but for me wanting to do the CPR, I couldn't give berth if there is no pulse."
"The other thing I needed to do was to get someone to take us over there, I didn't want to leave him there."
