Justina Ejelonu: A Name That Should Never Be Forgotten

August 18, 2020 | Nursing Article

In this article you will read about Justina Ejelonu: A Name That Should Never Be Forgotten

Nrs. Justina Ejelonu, 25, was the first Nigerian to die from the Ebola outbreak of 2014. While everyone was terrified, some were working their lives off to save the Nigerian people.
Justina Ejelonu was a Registered Nurse from the Ebonyi State University. Like everyone else with career goals, She had finished her NYSC and relocated to Lagos for a job. Her first duty and first patient to nurse on her first day at work (21st July) was the late Patrick Sawyer who was admitted a day before (20th July), the Liberian-American, who brought the deadly Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) to Nigeria.

Justin a Ejelonu RN, BNSc

On an unfortunate day when the notice was getting to the Nigerian people, she wrote this:
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“I never contacted his fluids. I checked his Vitals,helped him with his food.(he was too weak)…..i basically touched where his hands touched and dats d only contact.not directly wt his fluids.@a stage,he yanked off his infusion and we had blood everywhere on his bed…..but d ward maids took care of that and changed his linens with great precaution…”
Patrick yanking off his infusion out of anger necessitated the contact the late Dr. Stella Adadevoh had when reinserting his needles. It didn’t stop at that, the late Patrick at a time, start splashing his blood and urine as a form of resilience that the women put up in terms of respective policy and therapeutic communications to calm him down and limit the spread of infections. Nrs. Ejelonu implemented the process of the quarantine which Patrick has always wanted to break even when it cost her an irredeemable damage after the whole event.
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Like everyone else, Justina had dreams, died with an unborn child and a wedding that never took place. The least everyone can give to her is that respect of Honor.
Today, 14th August 2020 makes it 6 years that the hero was taken from us.
RIP Nurse Justina Ejelonu
Source: health workerbio