SOOTHING THE SUFFERING
Dr. Duncan Nickerson, medical director of the burn unit at Foothills Medical Centre, and survivor Don Adamson are devoted to assisting burn victims. A gala will be held New Year’s Eve to help fund the unit and the Herald Christmas Fund.
Don Adamson has spent a lifetime around airplanes, from military aircraft to big commercial jets.
“Fire safety is about the biggest concern in my business,” says the semi-retired avionics engineer. “You need to take all the necessary precautions.”
All his experience and expertise, though, couldn’t have prevented the 2005 explosion that nearly cost him his life. “I was on my way home from a business meeting when my car stalled,” he recalls. “I started it up again, and then boom!”
A short in the vehicle’s electrical system was to blame for the fire that swept through his vehicle. Waking up three weeks later in hospital, Adamson was told by a nurse that he was at Foothills Medical Centre.
“I said, ‘ Where’s that?’” he says with a chuckle. “I’d never been sick a day in my life and had never been there even to visit.”
These days, you can often find the gregarious 67-year-old wandering the halls of the hospital’s third floor, home of the Calgary Firefighters Burn Treatment Centre.
“I know some people when they get out, they never want to return,” he says.
“I might be a little different, but I just thought this was an amazing place,” says Adamson, who went on to become one of the founders of the Canadian Burn Survivors Community.
“Being here is a very paying-it-forward thing for me,” says the volunteer of many years. “Plus, I get to be around all these amazing people.”
On Dec. 31, the Calgary Firefighters Burn Treatment Society will host its annual New Year’s Eve Charity Gala, in partnership with Calgary Health Trust and the Calgary Herald Christmas Fund. Funds raised at this year’s event will go to the Calgary Firefighters Burn Treatment Centre, as well as to the 12 recipients of the 2017 Calgary Herald Christmas Fund.
Since its inception in 1978, the Calgary Firefighters Burn Unit Society has been dedicated to improving the lives of burn survivors. Over the past four decades, its work has raised nearly $9 million for the Foothills Medical Centre unit that bears its name, for everything from state-of-theart equipment to research and patient support.
“Our board of directors consists of 25 individuals, all volunteers,” says society president Jim Fisher. “We have 1,400 firefighters who can help out — plus, we are super fortunate living in such a generous city as Calgary. People believe in us and the work we’re doing.”
On a recent day, Adamson is at his usual spot in the centre’s family lounge, visiting with those who dedicate their days to caring for those who have experienced what is technically known as a thermal injury.
“Of all the different kinds of trauma that can befall the human body, burns are some of the toughest to recover from,” says Dr. Duncan Nickerson, a plastic surgeon and the centre’s medical director. “Any day you think your job is tough, you look to your patients — they are an extraordinarily resilient and inspiring group of people.”
He was set on his career path more than 30 years ago, when his William Aberhart High School teacher Keith Mercer put him in a science enrichment program.
“He’s one of the most influential people in my life,” says Nickerson, who also counts his instructors in the program as mentors. “It’s been a neat circle of life for me,” he says, noting he took over the leadership of the unit from Dr. Robert Lindsay, one of those he met all those years ago.
On this day, the busy surgeon has only a brief of window of time to chat, before heading off for a full day in the operating room. But he makes up for the brevity of conversation with passion when describing the place he’s overseen for the past decade.
“It is a team sport, made up of doctors of different disciplines,” he says of the centre, which takes in burn patients from southern Alberta, southeastern British Columbia and southwestern Saskatchewan. Each year, the centre treats approximately 100 in-patients and more than 500 out-patients.
The centre’s nurses have various sub-specialties, and there are occupational therapists, physiotherapists, psychologists and dietitians on staff.
In addition to patient care, Nickerson and his colleagues conduct research in their discipline, work he credits the Calgary Firefighters Burn Unit Society for helping to make pos- sible.
“Staying at the cutting edge and advancing things beyond where they are now is an expensive venture,” he says. “But in order to advance care beyond where we are in 2017, we need to do this work as well.”
Adamson says he’s living proof of the improvements in care over the years. “If my accident had happened 10 or 15 years earlier, I probably would have died. And today, things are so much better from my time as a patient.”
While the one-stop shopping approach here is in keeping with other tertiary burn centres across North America, Adamson insists that Calgary is head and shoulders above the rest.
“I’ve been going to burn survivor conferences all over for years, and I always make sure to visit their burn treatment centres,” he says. “Everything done here in Calgary is the best I’ve seen — from the infrastructure to the team effort and the people.
“Even the people they have cleaning the rooms are special,” he says. “Some might not be able to handle seeing patients as badly injured as some are. And the nurses are angels who walk among us.”
That teamwork focus, says Tanya Miller, is what drew her in more than two decades ago as a nursing student. “It can be a tough place to work at times,” she says, referring to some of the more traumatic injuries her patients have to overcome.
“You definitely need to be dedicated, just celebrate the small milestones our patients meet,” says Miller, a nursing unit manager, who adds that staff often get to know patients and their families quite well due to what can often be care and recovery time spanning weeks, months and, as out-patients, even years.
They also get together with burn survivors at annual events like their summer picnic and Christmas party.
“We couldn’t do these events without the help of the Calgary Firefighters Burn Unit Society,” says Miller. “Some become isolated after, and at our events, they can be around other survivors.”
When he isn’t helping out others whose experiences he understands, both in-patient and in the community, Adamson is also a regular fixture at the gatherings, lending his moral support and knowledge to those who now walk in his shoes.
“I have a very different outlook on life today. I see everything as precious,” he says with a smile. “I like to impart that to my fellow burn survivors.”