Capt. Karla Clarke
Army ICU nurse’s words, touch help wounded
LANDSTUHL, Germany — He may never remember her words. Her reassuring voice. Her calming touch.
Still, the nurse speaks.
Amid the beeps, buzzes, bags, bars, cords, tubes, heat lamps, wires, bandages and dressings, Army Capt. Karla Clarke talks to her patient — a fellow soldier.
The soldier under her care this day in Landstuhl’s intensive care unit is suffering from burns to 50 percent of his body, the result of a car bomb in Iraq. Metal bars protruding from his skin secure his left leg. An inflatable cast steadies his right ankle for the upcoming medevac flight.
Sedated, he breathes with the help of a ventilator. His breathing tube rhythmically bleats like a tired, broken kazoo.
"I talked to your mom yesterday," Clarke told the soldier. "She said she loves you."
Whether patients may not remember her words does not deter Clarke. They may hear. They may remember.
"Half the time, they don’t remember what happened last," she said. "Just think about how you would feel tied down, not being able to move, bright lights on you, heat. A lot of times, we just talk to them and just let them know. They might not know right then what’s going on. They might know what's going on later on. We just keep reorienting, reorienting — letting them know where they're at and that they’re safe.
"A lot of times it's just that they're safe."
Clarke worked pediatrics at Landstuhl for a year before moving to the ICU. She extended until July 2008, when she’ll leave — if she doesn’t extend again. Clarke heaps praise on Landstuhl's doctors, chaplains, social workers, volunteers, command group and fellow nurses. Everyone but herself.
On the day she treated the burn patient, Clarke had a ROTC cadet shadow her and also cared for a female contractor with chest pains. Clarke did not sit down until five hours into her shift, and she ate lunch at 2 p.m. Her work often exceeds her 12-hour shifts. She'll call the ICU from home in the middle of the night to check on wounded troops, whom she equates with family.
Clarke always wanted to be a nurse, but said she never thought she was smart enough. She served as an enlisted soldier for 16 years — outside the medical field — before pursuing her dream. Clarke now holds a bachelor's degree in nursing and loves education.
Two incidents from high school stick in her mind. Clarke remembers coming home from school one day. A little kid asked for help in finding his dog. She told him she did not have time.
At the mall with her friends, Clarke saw a man fall, and she got up to help. Her friends told Clarke she didn’t know anything and not to help. She succumbed to peer pressure.
"That was my two people that I passed up that I didn't help in life," she said. "I will never do that again. If I can help anybody at all, I will."
On an August day, Clarke helped a soldier by administering medicines; changing pads around his burns; resting a gloved hand on his head during a tricky bed-to-gurney transfer; staying in his room long after others left; following him out of the ICU; lifting him onto a bus.
And talking to him.
