Friday, December 02, 2005

PLANTATION, Florida (AP) -- A week after Hurricane Wilma, more than 1 million Florida homes are still without power and many doctors' offices remain closed, leaving hospitals swamped as the only source of medical care in some communities."You can't get any regular doctors on the phone. You can't get anything filled," said Tim Swett, 41. He waited five hours at one emergency room and finally left without help for a back problem he had aggravated while cleaning up his mother's yard.It wasn't until he tried another hospital, where disaster teams were set up in tents to handle minor injuries, that he saw a doctor.To help ease the medical crunch, the Federal Emergency Management Agency set up disaster medical assistance teams at four hospitals to help people with minor injuries, prescription medicine or those trying to follow up on routine medical care.At Westside Regional Medical Center in Plantation, a team had seen 190 patients -- including Swett -- by Sunday morning after opening Thursday. The hospital had twice its normal traffic in the days after Wilma hit, said Chief Executive Earl H. Denning."They were being overrun," said Bill Wallace, who is commanding a team of 35 doctors, nurses and others working out of four tents set up in the hospital's parking lot.Wilma was the eighth hurricane to strike or swipe Florida in 15 months. The storm killed 21 people in the state after battering Jamaica, Haiti and Mexico with strong wind and rain, and then tearing across the Gulf and Florida's southern peninsula. In all, 38 deaths were blamed on the hurricane.Sunday afternoon, state officials said about 2,000 people remained in Florida's emergency shelters, most in Palm Beach and Broward counties. Public schools in Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties remained closed.Florida Power & Light, the state's largest electric utility, said some areas might not get their power back until November 22, two days before Thanksgiving.But in a sign of progress, 2.2 million customers who lost power after the hurricane were back online Sunday, the company said. And while traffic lights were still out around the region, and broken glass, toppled trees and downed power lines continued to create obstacles, the long lines at gas stations had disappeared. The Lower Keys and Key West were also scheduled to open to tourists on Monday.Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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