My Last EM shift
Naration: The story you are about to read is true, the facts have been changed to protect my ego.
::Cue Dragnet music::
Naration: This is the city, Newark, New Jersey. Population 273,546 citizens, a significant number of which do not speak a word of english. Newark is not all that different than most of the country, a city where every child has a baseball bat, except nobody owns a ball or a mit. But there are things that set Newark apart from the rest of the country, Like the fact that it has the purest heroin in the USA. And when the population of Newark is finished beating eachother with bats, and shooting poison into their bodies, they come to me. My name's Medtec, I carry a stethoscope.
::More Dragnet music::
Naration: A few hours into my shift, I had a rather nice older couple come into the ER. The wife has managed to cut her hadn on a metal cabinet, and after an X-ray revealed no foreign body, I prepared to close the wound. After checking the ER supply room, I decided I needed to go to the trauma bay to find the supplies I needed. Upon stepping into trauma I saw a chaotic scene before me.
Surgical Resident: Quick, this guy needs bilateral chest tubes, doesn't anyone know where to find anything here? Get me someone who know what to do here.
::Medtec dashes to shock trauma, and weaves his way through throngs of surgical personal, deftly retrieving 2 chest tubes, 2 11 blade scalpels, and 2 0-nylon stiches::
Medtec: Here you go, crisis solved.
SR: Thankyou, what would we have done without you, but dude, who wears a cape to work in an ED?
::scene cuts back to the main ED. Traumas have continued to occur, diverting most of the ED physicians to assist in the care of these cases. Though he is not officially a doctor, he finds himself the only doctor on his side of the ED. Medtec has finished suturing, and is filling out his paperwork while instructing one of the ER nurses on the proper uses of lidocaine with epi. He glances up to see that the psych patient, formerly in 4 point leather restraints is standing, and putting his shoes on.::
Medtec:That's odd, isn't that patient supposed to be restrained?
Nurse: He was, how did he get up and dressed?
::At this point the patient stands, and agressively charges at a woman who is seated in the ED. A woman later identified as his girlfriend.::
Psych patient:
::Medtech bolts to his feet::
::cue western showdown music::
Medtec: Hey there partner. I reckon you might wanna step away from that there lady, and sit back down on your bed.
PP:
Medtec: Sir, we can do this two ways, either you sit down on your stretcher like a good little portugese hoodlum, or things get rough. I have a pocket full of guiac cards, and I'm not afraid to use them.
::The psych patient steps back, visibly cowed::
PP: I'm so sorry sir, please don't hurt me. Would it be alright if I went to the bathroom. I fear I might have an acident here.
Medtec: I reckon that'll be alright.
::PP quickly walks to the security guards, who walk him to the bathroom::
Nurse:: Thankyou Medtec, and I really like the cape.
Medtec: Sorry ma'am. I've already got myself a little lady.
::Some time lapses, and we return to the Main ED, wtih Medtec behind a desk
Naration:: A little while later Medtec sits at the somputer reviewing labs, and completing the workup of an admitted patient when suddenly...
::The scene flashes red briefly::
Medtec: Medical sense tingling. We're about to get an unresponsive diabetic. Get ready to push an amp of D50.
Nurse: Okay.
::EMT's roll in a patient on a stretch, she is an older lady on 10LPM nia NRB, and is not moving::
EMT: We have an unconscious, unresponsive diabetic, no medics were avaiable, I'm sorry we couldn't give you advance warning.
Medtec: She looks like she'll have a bloodsugar of about 60, lets get an IV and push that sugar.
EMT: Ha Medtec, you're wrong, it was 57 in the field. And no self-respecting EMT would wear a superhero cape.
Medtec: Dude, I was trying not to be too egomaniacal in this post. And lay of my superhero cape. They're required.
::The nurse starts an IV and pushes in an amp of d50.::
Patient: Where am I? How did I get here?
Medtec: It's okay citizen, your sugar was low, and they brought you to the hospital. It's all okay now.
Naration: It was just another Friday night in an inner city ER. Lives saved, paperwork completed. Some people hate emergency room work. But they aren't me. This is who I am. This is what I do.
::roll credits::