Rebecca Werner, a nurse in the Intensive Care Unit at San Joaquin General Hospital, sits on the porch of her home in River Gate on Monday. Werner is leaving today for a two-week trip to help Hurricane Katrina victims in a small Hospital in Wiggins, Miss. (Mike Graffigna/News-Sentinel)

Lodi-area nurses to help hurricane victims

Becky Werner and her sister, Lynda Moss, are on their way this morning to a rural Mississippi hospital to provide medical care for the Hurricane Katrina victims who most desperately need it.

Werner, who lives in Lodi, and Moss, who lives part of the time in Acampo, are nurses who will volunteer their skills to sick and injured Mississippi residents and give nurses there long-overdue rest.

But what the team of 22 nurses from throughout California will experience is quite a mystery. They will work for the next two weeks at Stone County Hospital in the town of Wiggins, Miss., about 40 miles north of Biloxi and Gulfport, which received some of the most severe hurricane damage.

Stone County Hospital is a 15-bed hospital that is not equipped with an intensive care unit, emergency room or maternity center, according to Werner, an ICU nurse at San Joaquin General Hospital in French Camp.

"I have no idea what I'm getting into," she said. "Us being there means maybe (other nurses) can go home and get some rest."

According to the Hattiesburg American newspaper in Mississippi, Wiggins was without electricity for several days, brick walls were ripped from downtown storefronts, windows were blown out and metal traffic signs were bent over on sidewalks "like plastic straws."

Werner said she heard that Wiggins got its electrical power back on Sunday.

Here's some of the things they've heard about Stone County Hospital, according to Werner:

• Some 150 patients have been crammed into the 15-bed hospital, including people on ventilators who were delivered to their doorstep.

• The staff has already delivered babies, but the hospital isn't equipped for childbirth.

• The California nurses have been promised nothing more than a floor and a roof for shelter. Werner said she's bringing a pair of bed sheets, an air mattress and a pillow.

• California nurses were told to bring 10 days worth of nursing outfits because no laundry will be available.

Werner, 54, and Moss, 56, were scheduled for a 6:30 a.m. flight today from Sacramento to the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport. From there, they will fly to Jackson, Miss., about 50 miles from Wiggins.

Werner learned about the opportunity to volunteer her time in Mississippi when she got an e-mail from the California Nurses Association, which was seeking volunteers. She completed an on-line questionnaire from the Mississippi Board of Nursing so she could get a temporary nursing license for that state.

Werner e-mailed her questionnaire on Friday and got a phone call requesting her services the same night. Moss was accepted the following day.

"We need to do our bit and contribute," Moss said, explaining why she chose to volunteer. "Nurses kind of have that caretaking urge."

Werner will be using two weeks of vacation time from her regular job at San Joaquin General to volunteer in the Gulf Coast. As a part-time nurse, Moss didn't have any vacation time in the first place.

Moss cut short a vacation, where she was salmon fishing in a rural area of Vancouver Island, Canada. It was so remote she had no access to TV, computers or cell phone. She had heard something about a hurricane along the Gulf Coast, but she had no idea about the devastation that hit the region.

Moss showed up at Werner's house in Lodi late Monday afternoon, suitcase in hand, having just landed from Sacramento International Airport. Her other suitcase, which she isn't taking to Mississippi, contains a 25-pound salmon. Moss will be right back at Sacramento International this morning for her flight to Mississippi.

In Mississippi, Werner will lend her expertise as an intensive care unit nurse for adult patients, while her sister specializes in pediatric patients. A part-time nurse at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, Moss stays with a daughter in San Francisco when she works, and she stays with another daughter occasionally in Acampo.

While not working, Moss lives in a home she owns in eastern British Columbia, Canada.

Werner has only been a nurse for 10 years. She entered the field after being an office manager for Golden Grain Macaroni in the Bay Area. After determining that she could no longer afford the cost of housing in the Bay Area, she enrolled in the nursing program at San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton.

Moss said she figures it's her turn to help.

"If the shoe was on the other foot, I hope that people would help us out," Moss said.

Contact reporter Ross Farrow at rossf@lodinews.com.