 LifeCare provides long-term acute care for severely ill patients, aiming to improve their health to the point that they no longer need hospital care.Many of LifeCare's patients at Memorial were especially affected by the loss of electric power; seven were on ventilators.One patient in particular, Emmett Everett, was alert and in the hospital awaiting surgery to relieve a chronic bowel obstruction, a condition not acutely life-threatening.