ADVENTURES IN MEDICINE

A nurse came through the double doors beside reception and called my name. I looked at my watch as I stood up. It was almost 10:00 pm. She directed me through the triage area to a large room of beds, each with a curtain. Most of the beds were occupied. She asked me to change into a hospital gown and despite it being much too small for me, I did. She returned and took two tubes of blood from my right arm. Saying the doctor would be right in, she closed the curtain and left. I was back in the machine.

On the other side of the curtain beside my bed, a young man was telling his mother how he had been riding his bike and collided with a parked truck. He began to weep as he told her the doctors had said his jaw was broken and they were going to wire it shut. For a few moments, I forgot about why I was there and felt sad for the young man. I told myself, ‘Now HE needs to be here.’

A tall youthful-looking doctor in hospital scrubs came through the curtain at the foot of the bed. He was very friendly and asked me to lay back. While poking and prodding the swelling around my navel he asked numerous questions. Finally, he said he would be right back with his boss. A few minutes later a doctor several years older, the original doctor who had examined me and a young female intern entered. Again I answered all the questions pertaining to how I felt and what I was experiencing. The senior doctor instructed the woman to touch the lump on my stomach also. He told me there could be a few things inside my abdomen causing the bump but he was very sure it was not caused by a hernia. The only way to know for certain what it was would be to do an ultrasound. Looking me in the eye he said that the ultrasound department was closed at that time of night except for emergencies.

It seemed to me that they should have been able to tell me that when I first arrived, but I suppose the machine needed to process me, as product, before making any statement. I allowed myself one slow breath before answering that of course it was. He said the nurse would make the arrangements for me to come back the following morning to have it done. Once they left I put my clothes on.

I considered what I had seen at the emergency department and knew some of those people really needed to be there. They were hurt and in pain. Some of the homeless and street people treated it like a place to hang out and appeared not to have much wrong with them. It seemed to be a substitute place to get minor care in the absence of having their own doctors.

I was not sure where I fit into the picture. There was nothing seriously wrong with me but I had been sent there by a doctor. Seeing and hearing people in real distress made me feel a little embarrassed to be taking up the medical staff’s time. And I did not like feeling like a small piece in a large machine being processed. Also, I had wandered around the department and treated it like a social event too, so I could not really condemn the homeless patients. It left me with much to think about and a conviction that I did not want to go there again unless I was for certain in distress.

The next time my doctor wanted to send me there to be checked over I definitely would want to debate the idea with him a little. The machine had better things to do at emerge than deal with casual complaints.