Doctor in Orlando nightclub shooting remembers chaotic first hours

ORLANDO, Fla. >> He knew it was bad when he heard the tone in Dr. Chadwick Smith’s voice on the other end of the line. The conversation took less than 10 seconds.

“I have 20 gunshot victims,” Smith said. “I need you.”

Dr. Michael Cheatham hung up, jumped into his car and raced to the Orlando Regional Medical Center, where he’d worked for two decades. His mind raced, too. Twenty. He was minutes away from the hospital when he saw a sea of flashing blue lights outside the Pulse nightclub. He’d driven by Pulse hundreds of times on his way to work. He’d never seen that many emergency vehicles in one place. It was just after 2u2009a.m. Sunday.

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When he arrived in the emergency room, he could tell immediately something had gone terribly wrong.

“Every bed in the trauma bay was filled,” said Cheatham, a trauma surgeon at the medical center. “There were things all over the floor. There were dead bodies covered in sheets in the hallway.”

Smith quickly directed him to a victim who was badly bleeding. The person had a gunshot wound in the back. It took Cheatham 30 minutes to sew him up. As soon as he was done, another victim was rolled in. It was like a MASH unit.

“It was one after another after another after another,” he said.

Just a little more than 48 hours since the mass shooting in Orlando claimed 49 lives, left the gunman dead, and sent scores of wounded clubgoers to the Orlando Regional Medical Center, Cheatham said he still hadn’t had a moment to reflect on being a part of the tragedy.

The 53-year-old, who grew up in Ventura before moving to Teessee to study at Vanderbilt University, said in the first four hours following the shooting he was involved in 12 operations. Normally, he’d perform from two to six.

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It was such a mass-scale tragedy that the patients were arriving by “truckloads” instead of ambulances, said Dr. Kathryn Bondani, an emergency physician who was also tending to victims early on at the medical center. The scale of the tragedy was too great.

Cheatham said the early surgeries were simply about stopping the bleeding and closing up wounds. By around 7 a.m., he said, he began directing traffic inside the trauma center — identifying which victims needed more assistance.

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The hours went by quickly. The surgeries continued. Even Tuesday, he said, six of the patients remained in critical condition and he was worried about the long-term effects on two of them. One, he said, was still in a coma after being shot in the head.

After working relentlessly for 40 straight hours, the weary Cheatham finally was approached Monday by Mark Jones, president of the Orlando Regional Medical Center.

“He ordered him to go home and rest,” said Orlando Health spokeswoman Kena Lewis.

Cheatham did.

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He drove home and had dier with his wife and daughter. He said it was a much-needed moment to try and slow down. But his mind still wandered back to the victims. He knew he’d have to get back.

After he finished eating, he got a second instruction.

“My wife ordered me to go to bed and get some sleep,” Cheatham said.

The doctor followed her instructions and finally drifted off Monday night.

But by Tuesday moing, he was back at the Orlando Regional Medical Center, monitoring patients. Since he started on Sunday moing, 44 patients had been admitted. When he got back in Tuesday, 22 remained, including Angel Colon.

Colon sat in a row of chairs with the other medical staff to face a roomful of media. He didn’t remember if he treated Colon’s injuries, but Cheatham was grateful to see him alive.

The 26-year-old thanked them all.

“If it wasn’t for you guys I wouldn’t be here,” Colon said. “I’ll love you guys forever.”