The ER is the wildcard of medicine. You never know what the day will bring. Some days are slow and you see a few of the regulars: shortness of breath, fever, cough, low back pain, dental pain. Some days are busy and full of the kinds of ailments that are served much more efficiently and holistically in the primary care provider's office. Some days brings horror.
I recently witnessed my first cocaine overdose. Hyperthermia, hypertension, tachycardia: the sympathomymetic toxidrome, the awful truth of what can happen to what is essentially a kid. It was difficult to watch a person who is in leathers with dilated pupils, appearing scared and basically unresponsive but it is even more difficult to see their parent when they come in the room and know that it was the coke and wonder why it had to happen to their kid.
There was not a whole lot we could do for this person but we did everything we could. People who were on call at home came in to the hospital. Other ER patients had to wait. Medicines, hopeful antidotes, lined the counter and waited for their turn to be injected into the veins of a person who is not really with us anymore, and likely will not return. The overdose was strong, it antagonized many of the interventions. Finally a call was made to move the patient to a bigger institution. Maybe they could help.
As financially inefficient as it is I would rather have a day full of ear infections, colds and low back pain than a coke overdose. That is something the world could do without.
2 comments:
scary. makes you want to go home and hug your kid doesn't it?
ya, but not until I cleanse and dispose of my clothes into the contaminated pile.
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