Published at 1:01 am. Updated at 7:00 a.m.
Every morning, patients arrive on the second floor of the Montreal Heart Institute (MHI) and wait for their surgery with a mix of hope and fear. A burden that Rawad Rmeily has experienced thousands of times since his first life-threatening patient 21 years ago, as a young military nurse in Lebanon.
Mr. Rmeily, 45, came to Canada in 2005 with his wife Charlie, also a nurse. Both came to the ICM in 2006 after refresher courses. After working in the intensive care unit, Mr. Rmeily is now assistant coordinator of the operating room, which includes seven operating rooms where surgeons are surrounded by a small army of respiratory therapists, nurses, perfusionists and other staff.
“For more than ten years, he has been helping me every day to coordinate activities related to the organization of cardiac surgery,” says his boss Julie Richard, operations coordinator, who wrote about him to La Presse. “He has the composure and organizational skills of an air traffic controller in a work environment with many moving parts,” adds Ms. Richard. She believes her innate qualities were also enhanced by her experience as a military nurse. She also emphasizes that her assistant has the ability to give confidence to people undergoing surgery.
Every morning he is at my side and greets the patients with a smile, empathy and calm to relieve their stress.
Julie Richard, Operations Coordinator
Mr Rmeily was born near Zahle, a predominantly Christian town, and remembers the event that ended his childhood: “I was 12 or 13 years old, my brother and I were at a scout camp. There was a bomb attack near the school we were at. We ran through the wounded to get home. »
Shortly thereafter, Mr. Rmeily joined the Lebanese Red Cross youth program and joined a response team at the age of 19.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY RAWAD RMEILY
Rawad Rmeily (third from left) joined a Lebanese Red Cross team at the age of 19 before completing his military service.
After studying at university and spending a year as a nurse at the Riyak Hospital in his home region, he was called up for his one-year military service in the Lebanese army. “It's an experience that gives maturity that you don't normally have at 22, 23 years old,” says Mr. Rmeily. A perspective that he maintains in his current job at the ICM, which he speaks enthusiastically about, a position in a high-intensity environment that brings him “close to the patients and close to the employees.”
But in September 2001, he was aboard an ambulance sent to eastern Lebanon, near the Syrian border, to rescue two soldiers injured by drug traffickers. One had bullets in his legs, the other had a bullet very close to his heart.
“The hospital in the region was not equipped for this. […] We drove towards Beirut and the military hospital. »
Mr. Rmeily, at the age of 23, treated a soldier his age with a bullet lodged in a heart artery. “Unfortunately we weren't well equipped, we intubated him in the ambulance, then we had no blood, just fluid. And he was bleeding profusely. »
The man injured in the leg survived, but the man injured in the chest did not.
“If he had been taken to a modern hospital in time, he would certainly have survived. But that evening we couldn't provide the best care. We don't have what we need. […] I lack experience. Also the doctor, he is 26 years old and has just completed his studies. This boy was unlucky. »
“It’s extraordinary here”
This is the exact opposite of the conditions in which he receives ICM patients today, who have everything that modern medicine has to offer.
And if that memory remains alive, it has in no way dampened his optimism, says Mr. Rmeily.
“When I arrived, I brought my experience and took care of people by being human. People are very stressed when they arrive in the operating room and they see me when they arrive. Over time, I have adopted an approach that allows me to bring back security and trust that we are like family and are there for you. I see that the patient loosens up a bit afterwards and has self-confidence. He starts talking to me about something else, about his family, his children. “And that's very good,” said Mr. Rmeily.
“It is extraordinary here compared to what we experienced in Lebanon. I tell patients that they are well cared for. “Everyone is specialized to the maximum. The technology is there, so the odds are in your favor.” »