| Thursday, October 11, 2007 |
| Some Things Are Hard to Forget |
Many years ago, I was working in a small, suburban hospital (no, not the one where I stitched up the self-mutilating female). I'd completed my work around 8 or 9p, but instead of shuffling off to the room allotted to me for the duration of my stay, I borrowed the book Jurassic Park from a colleague. (This was long before the movie ever came out. The owner of the book was about a third of the way through it, and he was on call that night. I knew I'd finish the book in a few hours.)
About 1a or so, there was an alert over the hospital's speakers. A teenager had been shot and dropped off, literally, in front of the emergency doors. His "friends" had sped off, so aside from what identification he had on him, there was no one to ask what had happened and what his medical and surgical history was. To make a long story short, everyone who was available raced to the ED, including yours truly.
The kid was immediately placed on a gurney, rolled into a treatment room; IVs were inserted, monitors activated, an operating room prepped. His heart rate was high, the rhythm not great. He was pale, cold. I took his blood pressure: it was something like 80/40 and dropping fast. When we finally found out the extent of his injuries, none of that was a surprise.
It turned out, you see, that the teen and his friends were out on the lonely highway down the road from the hospital, toward the heart of the town. As they cruised along, another car filled with teens joined the deserted highway. Somehow the 2 groups antagonized each (words or gestures or who-knows-what were exchanged). Someone in the second car opened fire along the side of first one, and lo!, our patient was hit.
So, the teen was wheeled off to surgery within 10-15 minutes of his being dumped on the ground outside the ER doors. Imaging studies taken during the course of his surgery revealed a bullet had entered his abdomen, nicked his abdomenal aorta, traveled up and toward his back, clipping part of his liver on the way, then lodged next to his spine. He was in surgery for hours, and he survived. The bullet could not be removed due to its dangerous location.
Amazingly, the boy not only lived, but 3 days after surgery, he was jumping up and down on his ICU hospital bed, generally being a nuisance and a brat. He was discharged home after a week. I don't know if the one who shot him was ever caught, or what happened to boy.
I often wonder about this kid, who, with the resilience, and perhaps the belief in immortality so many teens seem to have, seemed to brush off death so easily. I wonder if he made it to adulthood, and if he did, what effect, if any, knowing he carries a bullet in him has on him. Whether he has children of his own, and what he tells them about the souvenir he can't get rid of.
And yes, I finished the book at 4a.
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A few years later, I was working in a large, urban hospital. It was a hospital like any other in a big city. The neighborhood was poor and the ED was perpetually busy.
One night, a 19-year-old girl was brought in by ambulance in critical condition. She had been healthy teen until a week before. She had begun to feel unwell and was seen by her doctor, then diagnosed with a viral infection. When her symptoms didn't abate, she saw the doctor again, with the same result. A few days later, the night she came into the hospital, she suddenly collapsed at home.
In the treatment room, she was unconscious and unresponsive, her blood pressure was dropping rapidly, her veins had collapsed, and her heart rhythm was irregular. Large-bore IVs were placed directly into her arms and legs. She went into cardiac arrest. Despite the efforts of the emergency team, the girl was dead within 45 minutes of arriving in the hospital. It later turned out that a bacterium, Staphylococcus aureus, was the culprit.
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Another night, at the same large hospital, a newborn was brought to the hospital, not breathing. She was the youngest in a family that had 7 other children. The mother had laid the infant in the bed beside her, and while both slept, she had rolled onto the baby. When she awoke, the baby wasn't breathing, was pale and still.
In the ED, doctors worked frantically to revive the baby, even as the mother was frantic and wailing outside the room. She kept crying, "My baby! My baby!" It was heartbreaking to hear and see. And when the resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful, I had to turn away from the agony in everyone's faces. |
posted by Cheshire Cat @ 10/11/2007 05:06:00 pm   |
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| 1 teabag(s) brewed: |
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I think I saw that on the show "House" once. Glad you are back - I need 0t cruise through here more often...
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I think I saw that on the show "House" once. Glad you are back - I need 0t cruise through here more often...