I think one of the freakiest ways people die is aneurisms. Because there it is for years, a ticking time bomb you have no idea exists, until one day you get a horrible pain in your head and lose consciousness. Forever.
These are some of the hardest patients for me personally. Because often they are young and healthy, and if it weren't for the breathing tube in their mouth, they'd look like they were taking a pleasant nap. And all the life sustaining measures you are taking you know is just delaying the inevitable. At best, you are giving the family more time to realize that they are going to lose them.
It's the hope in the family's eyes that really gets me. That stubborn hope that clings even while the doctor says as gently as possible that this is most likely fatal. There is sorrow and fear and yet a resilient determination to believe that this case will be different. That surely, in this age of medical miracles, someone has a trick up their sleeve that will result in them beating the odds. Beating physics. But you've read the CT report, and you know that the only silver lining is the potential recipients of his organ donation.
The last case like this left mental pictures burned in my mind that will probably stay with me for a long time, taking their place in the mental slide show that often keeps me awake at night. A tearful wife laying across the lap of her unconscious husband, praying with all her might that he will wake up again. The soccer ball stamp on his hand that tells the story of an involved dad who unknowingly spent his last moments at his young child's game.
And his wife's eyes. So full of grief, so full of that stubborn hope. That will probably stay the longest.
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