Stories Archives - Page 26 of 58

X Factor

I was a brand-new intern on the intensive-care unit, and Cassandra was the very first patient I saw there. A petite, slender woman, she was rolled in on a stretcher, accompanied by her tall, athletic husband, Jack.

Cassandra was in her twenties, like me–but mortally ill. That grabbed my attention from the start. But the biggest lesson she taught me came about because we got her prognosis all wrong.

She had lupus, an autoimmune disease that unleashes the raw power of the immune system against the patient’s organs and joints. Fortunately, my attending rheumatologist, Dr. Schmidt, was an expert in lupus and its intricacies. Although small in stature, he cast a large shadow in the field; physicians from near and far referred their most challenging cases for his consultation. He radiated confidence, and, like my teammates, I admired his clinical acumen.

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Prayers of Passage

4 Comments / Stories / Jef Gamblée

The day began in Mom’s room with a 10:00 am conference at Upper Valley Medical Center, west of Columbus, Ohio. In attendance were my ninety-three-year-old mother Joanne (now in her third week of hospitalization), her palliative-care nurse Richard, her Episcopal priest Mother Nancy and myself.

Mom was on high-flow oxygen therapy delivered through a nasal cannula. Despite this, her blood-oxygen levels were well below normal. Clearly, her lung function was declining. Her heart wasn’t pumping well, and her blood pressure was barely seventy over fifty.

Things can change quickly with our elders. Thirty days earlier, Mom was going to dinner with friends and taking excursions in her assisted-living facility’s van to pick up things she needed, including small bottles of wine to share with “the girls” at dinner.

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Keeping the Flame Alive

6 Comments / Stories / David Coulter

This month, at medical schools across the country, first-year students will officially don the physician’s traditional white coat for the first time.

The white-coat ceremony is a powerful symbolic moment. It signifies that the students are moving beyond their identity as ordinary citizens and into their new identity as healers. The ceremony celebrates their idealism and their commitment to a life of caring for others. And, although they may not realize this, it constitutes a pledge to assume responsibility for their patients’ health and well-being–and the stresses that go with that commitment. As the students accept this responsibility, their lives will be forever changed.

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Shock Treatment

6 Comments / Stories / Amy Tengelics

I sat in the cold, sterile examination room, anxiously awaiting my new orthopedic doctor–the fourth in two months. I was losing hope of ever finding a doctor who would listen to me. The first three had suggested that my pain was all in my head

I want someone to take me seriously, I brooded. I don’t want to be brushed off as the stereotypical hysterical female. My pain is real, and I’m not crazy. I need someone to believe me.

Finally, there was a soft knock on the door.

“Good afternoon, I’m Dr. Lee.”

In front of me stood a man with an impeccably groomed goatee. He glanced at my elbows, which I have a habit of bending too far backwards while relaxing. Brow furrowed, he reached out to shake hands.

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Shock of Recognition

13 Comments / Stories / Susan Bartlett

Lying in a hospital bed while awaiting heart surgery, I looked at my teen daughter and my parents, then smugly pointed out the irregular slashes on the cardiac monitor.

“See these?” I said. “They’re called PVCs. My doctor is going to fix them. Make them all go away.”

The asymmetrical rhythm, a frequent and annoying pattern of multiple skipped heartbeats, had plagued me for the last three years, despite my swearing off caffeine and alcohol and trying different cardiac and thyroid medicines under my doctor’s supervision.

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First Time, Last Time

8 Comments / Stories / Kristin Nguyen

“Deeper compressions! Deeper! Make sure you get that recoil!”

I push harder and lift off higher. I’m starting to sweat. My stethoscope is banging around my neck. I should have taken it off, I think. My hair is flying around my face. I should have tied it up. I’m on tiptoe; my legs are cramping. I should have stood on a step stool.

“All right, she’s getting tired. Next!”

Embarrassing…I only lasted through one round of compressions. Other people (taller, more muscular people) are lasting longer. I really need to lift weights. Doing chest compressions is much more physically demanding than I’d thought.

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Dear Nurse

6 Comments / Stories / Catherine Ring Saliba

I was an RN for more than forty years and am now retired. As a recent hospital patient, I documented my experiences. This resulted in a letter to nurses everywhere.

Dear Nurse,

Please be kind to me. I am frightened, alone and in pain. I am way out of my comfort zone and need every bit of encouragement you have to offer.

I arrived at the emergency room a short while ago, was transferred from the ambulance stretcher to a narrow bed and told that a doctor would see me soon. Curtains were pulled around my little cubicle–for privacy, I assume–but honestly, I do wish they had left a small gap to let me see people, activity, life!

I do have a call bell within reach, thank goodness. For that I’m grateful. I do not, however, have a friend or family member with me for moral support. I didn’t want to impose on anyone, but I’m beginning to understand why it’s recommended. Example: I could really use a tissue! It doesn’t seem important enough for the call bell, but a friend could dash out to get one immediately.

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Every Doctor’s Nightmare

10 Comments / Stories / Bobak Akhavan

Bobak Akhavan ~

I was an intern, doing a rotation in the coronary-care unit (CCU) of a large urban hospital. It was very challenging: The patients had complex medical issues, and my fellow residents and I were given lots of responsibility for their care. Still, I felt I was finally getting the hang of residency.

One of the first patients I saw was Mrs. Smith, a middle-aged woman who had come to the emergency room with chest pain. We admitted her to determine whether she was suffering from coronary-artery disease that might lead to a heart attack.

Mrs. Smith was a kind, soft-spoken woman. Her daughter, Crystal, in her twenties, had inherited her mother’s brown eyes and hair. She lived with her mother, was very involved in her care and made sure that we knew her full medical history.

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Unexpected

6 Comments / Stories / Christine Loftis

Christine Loftis ~

“You’re twenty-seven-and-a-half weeks pregnant.”

As I lay on the exam table, time froze.

How can this be? I wondered dazedly. I’m a second-year medical student. I’ve just completed a course in female reproduction and endocrinology. How could I have missed the signs?

I attribute my obliviousness to the surgery I’d gone through only months before: the removal of a twenty-seven-pound, mucus-filled ovarian cyst. My lack of menstrual periods was nothing new; they’d been irregular for years. My recent abdominal bloating must, I’d thought, be the cyst recurring. I hadn’t worried about it because, frankly, I’d always put my health and personal life second to my future career as a physician.

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Bare Bones

9 Comments / Stories / Julie Evans

Julie Evans ~

Clutching my duffel bag under my rain jacket, I dash from my truck toward a house that was built by Frankie, the man I’m here to give the last massage of his life.

I’ve been massaging people since I was five and have been a professional massage therapist for forty years. I don’t make house calls anymore, but it’s an honor to give a man the last massage of his life, so here I am. My parents were ill when I was a child—my mother was an alcoholic, my father had severe emphysema—and being raised around pain and sickness taught me that there’s always something I can do to make a person more comfortable.

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Elephants: Another Day with CFS

7 Comments / Stories / Linda Koebner

Linda Koebner ~

Two elephants won’t leave me alone.

Every morning, as I struggle into consciousness, my brain makes plans. I will get up out of bed, go pee, find my way to the kitchen, put water on to boil, fit the paper into the coffee filter, grind beans, slow-pour over the grinds….

In my mind’s eye, I visualize that the coffee is hot, that the news I read is upsetting and that, caffeinated and dressed, I am up and into my day. My thoughts take me out the front door for a long walk with my dogs, and then to work.

The reality is that I haven’t moved a muscle.

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Exit Interview

5 Comments / Stories / Tamra Travers

Tamra Travers ~

“I’m graduating and leaving our clinic in June.”

Over and over again, in the months leading up to this transition, I break this news to my primary-care patients. I have developed many meaningful relationships with patients over my past three years of training as a family-medicine resident in a large, urban health center in Manhattan. But now it is time to leave and move on.

The fluorescent lights in an overly air-conditioned white clinic room illuminate face after face, all with the same look, staring back at me. Her face drops. His shoulders brace. His eyes shift. Her chronic low back pain tightens its grip. Her once improving mood slips back down. The eight-month-old bouncing and smiling on my lap quickly lunges back to Mom. She senses that her mother is hurting.

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