By Lisa Fernandez
San Jose Mercury News
Copyright 2008 San Jose Mercury News
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Power has been restored to the Kaiser Santa Teresa Medical Center this morning after a more than two-hour outage that affected emergency room service and prompted diversions to other hospitals.
Pacific Gas & Electric spokesman J.D. Guidi said the power went out for about 1,600 customers in South San Jose and Blossom Valley about 6 a.m. today, including Kaiser Santa Teresa. Power at the hospital was restored by 8:11 a.m.
For that two-hour period, the emergency room was closed to new patients, who were taken to other nearby hospitals, said hospital spokesman Karl Sonkin. The hospital ran on backup generators - both from fire department engines and from the hospital itself during the outage.
At least two patients who arrived when the power was out - a cardiac patient and a woman about to deliver a baby - were diverted to other hospitals, according to Fire Capt. Steve Alvarado. The 16 patients who were already in the emergency room were in stable condition and allowed to remain, he said.
Alvardao credited the quick thinking of a fire captain on duty - Steve Moreno - for helping prevent a problem at the Kaiser Permanente-run hospital.
“Our captain made the right calls and averted an emergency,” Alvarado said. “We worked alongside hospital staff and called the right agencies here to help. We analyzed the situation and worked fast. The whole point is to provide the best care for our customers, our citizens. There was no chaos.”
The outage occurred just a few minutes after a crew from Fire Station 18 arrived at the hospital with a patient who had suffered cardiac arrest. Moreno noticed there were no lights on in the emergency room and called the equivalent of a two-alarm fire at 6:06 a.m.
That phone call quickly drew a total of 30 firefighters, four engines and two trucks that arrived with generators, flashlights and other tools. In addition, five county ambulances waited on stand-by, poised to take any walk-ins to another hospital.
Alvarado said for an unknown reason, while the hospital emergency generator turned on correctly, the power didn’t kick in for a short period of time. The firefighters’ generators served as a bridge for that time period, he said, so patients’ weren’t directly affected.
Sometime around 6:30 a.m. or 7 a.m., however, the hospital’s emergency generator was working, and the firefighters’ generators continued to serve as backup.
Immediately after the power went out, fire crews and hospital staff went bed to bed, checking on patients to see how they were faring, Alvarado said.