Virginia Nurse Dies of TB

Maine Nurse, Aug-Oct 2004

Hundreds exposed, need to be tested

June 17, 2004

Deborah Byrd Chrysostomides was a 52-year-old, 125-pound registered nurse whose weight had dropped by 25 pounds in recent months.

She had a terrible, constant cough and barely enough energy to make it through a work day, said Tim Peluso, her fiance.

She had begun to lose her voice and was down to 100 pounds on her 5-foot, 4-inch frame before her death from tuberculosis Saturday in Bon Secours DePaul Medical Center in Norfolk.

As her health declined, she continued to work part time at Chesapeake General Hospital, thinking she was suffering from cancer, Peluso said. In an atmosphere of doctors and other health-care providers, no one appeared to notice Chrysostomides' decline, Peluso said.

"It shouldn't have happened," Peluso said Wednesday of his fiancee's death. "This whole thing was so unnecessary. Someone dropped the ball at the hospital.

"You see your employee dry up like that, lose all that weight and you do nothing."

Peluso and Chrysostomides had been together far 20 years. She had been a nurse for 30 years, he said.

Peluso said he begged her to seek help from a doctor. He offered to take her to Sentara Virginia Beach General Hospital, he said.

But she repeatedly refused, said Peluso, who recently tested negative for tuberculosis.

Her declining health was the subject of many arguments, which typically ended with her refusing to seek help, he said.

"She thought she had cancer or something and she didn't want to let anyone know," Peluso said as he cried outside his Virginia Beach home. "I think she had this stuff a long time, probably six to eight months."

Friends who wrote memorials on the Hollomon-Brown Funeral Home Web site described Chrysostomides as always smiling, helpful and a dedicated nurse. Reached at home, Chrysostomides' father declined to comment.

Her fiance described her as a caring nurse. The Maryland native was a graduate of Old Dominion University. Before her illness, she had worked at several area hospitals, including DePaul, Sentara Norfolk General and Sentara Leigh.

Last September or October, Paluso began to see a change in his fiancee. They would normally give a Christmas party at the Virginia Beach home they shared for as many as 50 guests. But there was no Christmas party last December - nor was there a Halloween party last year.

Chrysostomides wasn't up to it, he said.

However, she did manage to work her part-time job at the hospital, sometimes working on days she was supposed to be off, he said.

"She gave her heart," he said. "She was special to a lot of people."

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