Ronald Coronado, of Cathedral City, California, is a Quality Assurance/Quality Improvement Director for Maxim Healthcare, a national home care agency.
Taking Charge in a Crisis
All eyes were on him as he rushed into the ladies’ room at the Gold Strike Casino in Jean, Nevada.
“It’s okay. He’s a nurse,” one of the security guards assured the group gathered around an obese woman lying on her back on the restroom floor. “Is she alive,” the Spartan nurse asked the security guards. No one answered. “Does she have a pulse?” Again, no answer.
Ronald Coronado recalls that night. “A group of us had just finished a midnight meal at the casino restaurant, and I remember singing “Happy Birthday” to one of our friends since it was now officially his birthday. As we were leaving the casino, I saw a male security guard dragging an oxygen tank, running through the casino and into the ladies’ room. That’s when I identified myself as a nurse and asked if they needed help.”
When Coronado found that the patient had no pulse and was not breathing, he shouted, “Call 911! Who knows CPR?” Of the seven guards, only one said he knew CPR — but he weighed well over 300 pounds and could not bend over far enough to properly assist. The casino was in the middle of the Nevada desert, 30 miles from the nearest medical center. So the nurse performed one-man, bystander CPR for 30 minutes until a helicopter arrived from Las Vegas. After the flight nurse established an IV and gave an amp of D50, the woman started breathing on her own.
Making an Impact
Because of his MSU training, Coronado did not hesitate when help was needed. “Seeing a person collapsed in front of me was not intimidating at all. Even in nursing school, I was always the one to jump in and take charge during a code,” he says.
Coronado has had the opportunity to travel from coast to coast during a 25-year career that has included working as a chemo nurse, a home care nurse, a cardiothoracic nurse, a travel nurse, and the manager of an AIDS clinic. “I know the impact I have had with the patients that I’ve cared for, their families, and the students that I’ve trained. I’m passing forward the knowledge I obtained at MSU and afterwards; I know I am making a difference,” Coronado says. “There are many people who get to be my age and look back and wonder what they did with their lives, or if they made a difference in this world. I don’t wonder that.”
Nursing Provides a Diverse, Rewarding Career
“With the diversity under the umbrella of nursing, I have been able to do more than I would have ever done if I’d chosen another career. It’s been very rewarding
“I remember the woman from the casino gripping my hand as a gesture of thanks as they wheeled her from the ladies’ room to the helicopter,” Coronado adds. “I never saw her again; but I have thought about that moment and know that I made a difference!”
