Erlanger Closes Burn Center, Chattanooga Fire Fighters Object

People who suffer serious burns will now have to go Nashville or Augusta, Georgia for long term care.

Erlanger Medical Center shut down its burn unit Monday night.

Chattanooga Fire Fighters Association President Jeff Eldridge says, "The closest one to us is 150 miles 200 miles away." 

Fire and burning death are a constant fear for Chattanooga's fire fighters...one made even more real by the closing of Erlanger's Burn Center.

Eldridge says 52 to 55 fire fighters are on duty at any given time in Chattanooga.

He says if one of them gets burned, not having a local burn center makes it hard on their families, "The longer you go without being treated the more (likely) infection or even death could come."

The Medical Center released this statement Wednesday:

"In February 2008, the plastic surgeon who was a burn specialist and medical director of the Erlanger Burn Unit departed for a job in another state. We have been unable to recruit a replacement. After careful consideration and consultation with the local plastic surgeons providing coverage for the unit, Erlanger officials have determined that closing our burn unit is in the best interests of major burn patients. This change does not affect Erlanger’s status as a level 1 Trauma Center.

Burn patients will still be accepted at Erlanger. Those with major burns, especially with burns affecting more than 20 percent of their bodies, will be assessed, stabilized and transferred to the Joseph M. Still Burn Center in Augusta, Georgia, or the Vanderbilt Burn Center in Nashville, Tennessee, for long-term treatment. Pediatric burn patients will continue to be transferred to the Shriners Burns Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio, as has always been the protocol.

Less severe burns will continue to be treated at Erlanger, with plastic surgeons, trauma specialists, intensivists and other specially-trained professionals supervising their care in an appropriate area of the hospital – an intensive care unit, inpatient room and/or the Erlanger Wound Care Center. All of the employees of the unit have been absorbed into other areas of the hospital. This decision was made with the best interests of our patients as our primary consideration. We will continue to assess the situation."

Former Burn Center Relief Nurse David Thompson says closing the center puts Tennessee Valley burn victims at a disadvantage, "There's only one place that you can get this kind of care and that's at a burn center."

Thompson has been part of Erlanger's Burn Center staff for more than a decade.

He says the Burn Center at Erlanger housed 6 of only 1700 severe burn beds in the country, and closing the unit just doesn't make sense, "It's more than just a devastating loss. This was something that was a feather in the cap of Erlanger."

Now Thompson, a former fire fighter, and the Chattanooga Fire Fighters Association are rallying to re-open the burn center, "We need a commitment from the community, we need a commitment from industry, and we need a commitment from the fire department, everybody involved as to what we can do and maybe we can get the burn unit back up and running, even better hopefully."

The Chattanooga Firefighters Association is asking for your support in the fight to re-open the burn unit.

E-mail Association President Jeff Eldridge at firemn1078@aol.com.