A few nights ago, I was at work when I heard the emergency buzzer for Resuscitation Cubicle 5. I hurried along with several other medical staff to find an elderly woman lying unresponsive on the bed.
She was in cardiac arrest.
Everyone quickly found a job to do - start compressions, give medications, get more intravenous access, ventilate the patient, suction the vomit. In the midst of all that was happening, I heard my boss' voice say, "Has anyone contacted the family yet?"
The next thing I know, a phone was tossed at me whereby her unsuspecting daughter was on the other line. The ward clerk had contacted her for us and escalated the job of speaking to her to the doctor in closest proximity.
"Hi, this is Candice, one of the doctors in the hospital. Your mother has gone into cardiac arrest and we are attempting CPR at the moment. You need to come in now."
In that moment, she responded with this incredible, loud, heart-wrenching wail over the phone.
It's days later yet I can still hear that sound in my head ever so clearly.
"I'm coming in right now," she cried, just before she hung up.
Unfortunately, it was a matter of minutes later that a time of death was finally called.
...
If there's one word that I can use to describe the Emergency Department as I reflect on this memory, it's anguish.
I think also of the teary wife of the man who had successfully poisoned himself in his suicide attempt.
I remember the grieving husband travailing by the darkened bedside of his deceased wife.
I reflect on the son who had held back his tears in front of his mother and sister, and wept alone in the quiet corridor.
I look back at the woman who sobbed as she told me stories of her late husband who had passed away years prior.
I remember the daughter whose heart broke as she realised her father's time was finally coming to an end.
Week in week out, I'm there in the midst of that anguish, and I see the left-behind ones.
I may not remember all their names, but I remember their faces, and I remember their sorrow.
And deep in my heart as I walk away, I suppress a heavy recurring burden, this immense fear; that one day it would be my turn to be left behind and so carelessly abandoned in that place of utter anguish.
She was in cardiac arrest.
Everyone quickly found a job to do - start compressions, give medications, get more intravenous access, ventilate the patient, suction the vomit. In the midst of all that was happening, I heard my boss' voice say, "Has anyone contacted the family yet?"
The next thing I know, a phone was tossed at me whereby her unsuspecting daughter was on the other line. The ward clerk had contacted her for us and escalated the job of speaking to her to the doctor in closest proximity.
"Hi, this is Candice, one of the doctors in the hospital. Your mother has gone into cardiac arrest and we are attempting CPR at the moment. You need to come in now."
In that moment, she responded with this incredible, loud, heart-wrenching wail over the phone.
It's days later yet I can still hear that sound in my head ever so clearly.
"I'm coming in right now," she cried, just before she hung up.
Unfortunately, it was a matter of minutes later that a time of death was finally called.
...
If there's one word that I can use to describe the Emergency Department as I reflect on this memory, it's anguish.
I think also of the teary wife of the man who had successfully poisoned himself in his suicide attempt.
I remember the grieving husband travailing by the darkened bedside of his deceased wife.
I reflect on the son who had held back his tears in front of his mother and sister, and wept alone in the quiet corridor.
I look back at the woman who sobbed as she told me stories of her late husband who had passed away years prior.
I remember the daughter whose heart broke as she realised her father's time was finally coming to an end.
Week in week out, I'm there in the midst of that anguish, and I see the left-behind ones.
I may not remember all their names, but I remember their faces, and I remember their sorrow.
And deep in my heart as I walk away, I suppress a heavy recurring burden, this immense fear; that one day it would be my turn to be left behind and so carelessly abandoned in that place of utter anguish.
No comments:
Post a Comment