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  • Hope Dougherty (in black), walks beside Mayo Flight Nurse Todd Dorn and her sister, Tiffany Dougherty, at the Mankato airport Thursday. Dorn was one of Hope's two nurses on the flight to Rochester after her April accident. Hope doesn't remember much of the flight except for asking "Can I go to sleep?" (She could, and did.) Dan Linehan

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May 24, 2012

Seat belts, responders theme of Mayo appreciation event

By Dan Linehan Free Press Staff Writer

MANKATO — On the morning of April 29, 2011, then 18-year-old Tiffany Dougherty was driving her sisters, 14-year-old Regina and 12-year-old Hope, to school.

Tiffany wasn/t wearing her seatbelt and, about four miles away from their St. James home, she reached over to click it, distracted. When she looked up, the car was perilously near the ditch. She spun the wheel, overcorrecting, and the car flipped three times, ending up wheels-down in a farm field. Tiffany looked around the minivan. Her sisters were gone.

Regina was nearby and dazed, but fine. Hope was unconscious at first, and badly hurt. Her left leg, left arm and back were broken. Neither sister was wearing a seatbelt.

Hope was airlifted to the hospital in St. James and then to St. Marys Hospital in Rochester. She recovered.

At first, Tiffany didn't like to sleep because she re-lived the accident in her dreams. The nightmares are rare now.

The Dougherty family, including parents Art and Brenda, was in Mankato Thursday to thank the first responders who helped them as part of an appreciation event organized by Mayo Health System. Their accident was also a case study for the rescuers, both in the treatment of Hope's injuries and the coordination among the hospitals and transporters.

For the girls, though, it was clearly a difficult evening.

Tiffany cries softly as Hope's describes injuries are described in a clinical tone: broken femur, broken humerus, collapsed lungs, crushed 12th vertebra.

Hope joins her in tears as a blown-up X-ray of her badly broken leg is put on the screen. It's a picture the family agreed to allow to be shown, but one she hadn't seen before.

By the time the group sees a photo of Hope in her hospital bed, with tubes and a bruised face, both girls are crying.

From Mayo's perspective, it was a good chance to talk about coordination -- Hope rode a St. James ambulance to a Mayo hospital, then boarded the Mayo chopper to another Mayo hospital.

It was also a chance to remind the rescuers about the peculiarities of treating kids. The biggest emphasis: Children have a sort of reserve that makes them appear healthy even when they're badly hurt. A doctor said kids can appear fine at one point, then be near death just a minute later.

Todd Dorn, one of the two flight nurses who tended to Hope on the flight, said the most important thing for the Mayo One helicopter is time. He said the helicopter launches before it's known if it's needed for sure, and turns back perhaps one-third of the time. Dorn estimates the helicopter goes on about 700 missions a year.

The helicopter is useful not only for its speed (about 140 mph) but also for the equipment and nurses aboard. For example, nurses can give patients blood on a helicopter but not in an ambulance, Dorn said.

Dorn said some people assume that because the helicopter is owned by Mayo that its crew prefers Mayo hospitals. He said that's not true -- it flies to the closest trauma center.

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