OR Nurse Saves Life at Johnson Pond
Ursula Goodine, RN, and her husband David were hoping to spot redhead ducks at Johnson Pond in January when their Sunday afternoon of bird watching quickly turned into a rescue mission.
“We were leaving the area to go to Plum Island when we saw a young woman lying in the road face down,” said Goodine, a nurse in the Operating Room. The 25-year-old woman, named Kerri, had fallen off a horse near the pond.
Goodine jumped out of the car, told her husband to call 911 and rushed to Kerri’s side. “One woman was beside me, and I cautioned that we should not move Kerri in case she had a neck injury,” Goodine said.
Kerri wasn’t moving, but she was groaning when Goodine first reached her. “Seconds later, she stopped groaning, and we turned her over and found she had no pulse or respirations,” Goodine said. “The woman next to me cleared her face of blood and began mouth-to-mouth, and I began chest compressions.”
Goodine later learned that the woman performing mouth-to-mouth was Kerri’s mother, Audrey Hatch. “At one point, I stopped CPR and said, ‘It’s no use,’” Hatch said. “Ursula looked at me and said, ‘Don’t you ever give up,’ so we kept going. Were it not for that, I might have given up.”
They continued CPR—with help from Kerri’s uncle—for nearly 20 minutes until a fire rescue truck arrived and rushed Kerri to Anna Jacques Hospital in Newburyport. She was later taken to BWH’s Trauma and Burn Intensive Care Unit.
Goodine went straight to the ICU to check on Kerri after arriving at work the following Monday. There, she had an emotional reunion with the Hatches, who hadn’t known who Goodine was or where she worked.
“My husband said to me, ‘That’s the woman who saved Kerri,’” Hatch said. “She is an incredible person and has been supportive all the way through.”
Kerri received care in the Neuroscience ICU on 9C for three weeks. “The nurses on both 9C and the Trauma ICU are absolutely tremendous,” Hatch said. “The caliber of the nurses at the Brigham outweighs anything I’ve ever seen.”
Kerri was transferred to a rehabilitation hospital at the end of January and went home in March. She continues outpatient therapy.
“We’ve been given a miracle,” Hatch said. For Hatch and Goodine, this experience was testament to the value of knowing CPR.
“It’s important to maintain your CPR certification,” Goodine said. “You never know when you will need it to save someone’s life.”