Week Eight
It is crazy to me that it has already two months since my first blog. The past two weeks of work at the hospital have really helped me figure out where I want to be in the medical field. I always thought that I wanted to work with pediatrics, but my job has given insight to a completely different area of the hospital: the Intensive Care Unit. For some reason, I have floated down to ICU and IMCU for the past two weeks, and I have really enjoyed it.
The first week, I was definitely scared to be in a room by myself. Seeing nonresponsive patients and responsive patients on ventilators really helped me picture what the doctor in the book The Least of these My Brethren had to see every day. When I saw my first nonresponsive patient on life support, it was a lot more “real” than I could picture in a book or on television. I finally understood why my mother is so insistent on being a DNR patient. Life support patients have such a peace to them, but it isn’t because they look comfortable or like they are getting better. THEY LOOK DEAD! Even though they get discharged to another healthcare center after a week or so of being on life support, I can’t imagine having to be dependent on a machine having my family have to worry about visiting my vegetable-state body.
Furthermore, I finally got to be a part of a code blue. I heard the “cracking” of ribs on patient who didn’t make it, and the doctors knew that this particular patient wasn’t going to survive a full resuscitation. I could feel the hesitation in the room of the nurses who tried to convince the family to fill out a DNR form, but insisted that the hospital do everything that they could on their family member. I finally felt like I could relate to the doctor of the AIDS ward in the book who didn’t want to see patients suffer before they died if was unnecessary. I just felt so bad for this patient when I saw his dead body that was in horrible shape compared to what it looked like before. I know that family members want to believe that they are going to see a miracle take place, and maybe I will be in this situation one day, but I don’t want to be selfish about it.
These situations are inevitable in critical care units, and I never even thought about working in this particular field. I have never come home from work feeling as excited to go back. I always heard on the other floors that” critical care units are awful because you have to do more work.” Isn’t that why we get paid?
Did You Know?
"The number of cumulative AIDS diagnoses for children (under the age of 13) living in Florida was 1,571." (CDC, 2008)
Source:
Basis Statistics. (2008) TheCenterforDiseaseControl. Retrieved on October 20, 2010 from http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/basic.htm#aidsage
We keep people alive because we can't say goodbye. We don't seem to worry that they might be suffering, while we get the courage up to say goodbye. Watching the parents say goodbye to their baby or child is the most heart wrenching scene you will ever witness. I've had to take many babies off their life support. It never get easy.
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