Medical mentor respected for wisdom, kindness toward all

Accomplished medical practitioner, exceptional father, and mentor to children. Died of leukemia on Feb. 28 at age 60.

To those who knew him professionally, Terry Bourgeois was an accomplished respiratory therapist. But to those who knew him well, he was a warm person and an extraordinarily good listener.

“God gave him a gift to communicate to other people and help them when they were in trouble and put them in the right direction,” said Kathy Bourgeois, Terry Bourgeois’ widow. “…He was a good mentor, he really was.”

Kathy Bourgeois attributed Terry’s success as a respiratory therapist to his empathy She said he “had an uncanny insight into other people.”

Terry headed the cardiopulmonary care department at Ochsner St. Anne General Hospital in Raceland. He started there as a respiratory therapist 30 years ago and later became the director.

He was a “grandfather” amongst respiratory therapists in Louisiana, said Duke Domingue, a respiratory therapist who first learned CPR from Terry Bourgeois in 1990.

Terry was slated to receive the Pioneer Award from the Louisiana Society of Respiratory Care at their annual meeting in Baton Rouge this year, Domingue said.

“The Pioneer Award honors an individual who has dedicated a major portion of his life contributing towards the development and advancement of the Respiratory Care Profession,” the LSRC website says.

He was a member of the LSRC for years and served as its president. He was being honored for his role in the development and growth of both the organization’s Bayou Chapter and at the state level over the last three decades.

He was also named Ochsner Health System’s Clinical Management Leader in 2011.

Domingue said that Terry was an excellent manager and when called upon to offer his clinical expertise, he was “very competent.”

“Even though he was a manager, I was impressed by the way he kept his respiratory skills as far as drawing arterial blood gases and stuff like that,” Domingue said.

But most people who knew Terry Bourgeois personally did not know him in this light. To them, he was a warm, caring mentor.

Terry volunteered in the youth ministry at St. Hilary of Poitiers Church in Raceland. There, he led groups of kids through religious retreats.

“He was very good at creating fun situations to bring them into understanding how even though God is not concrete to us, he would make it concrete,” said Kathy Bourgeois.. .He did a lot of things that made kids understand what God really meant and how it affects our lives even though they don’t see it.”

He stressed mutual respect and love for one another, Kathy said.

Faith was important to Terry and he used his interpersonal skills to spread the understanding of Catholicism.

“He was a good listener and non-judgmental which [made] people just open up to him,” said Domingue. “He would’ve made a good priest at confession.”

Terry Bourgeois was a doting father to his two children, son, J.P. Bourgeois and his daughter, Jessie Bourgeois.

Domingue said that “he definitely made me a better dad with my kids seeing how he.. .interacted with his kids.”

Kathy Bourgeois said her late husband had a lot of “wisdom at an early age” and that trait is evident in their children as well. They are both self-respecting and respectful of others.

“I think that’s made a big difference, not only in our children’s lives, but in all the children that he had contact with in the youth groups,” said Kathy Bourgeois.

He would dress up as Santa Clause and visit with the children at St. Anne General Hospital.

“He made an awesome Santa, being so big,” said Domingue. “He was a big guy, but he had a big heart.”

Terry Bourgeois shows off his prized catch. Bourgeouis, an accomplished respiratory therapist, died Feb. 28.

COURTESY