fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

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Let’s Not Forget the Doctors

Birth can be hard work—even brutal terror—for new mothers and fathers. I’d like to point out that sometimes it’s no fun for doctors and nurses either. Sadly, we very occasionally see mothers or babies die or be grievously injured.

When the heartbeat of Sharlene’s baby kept slowing down, everyone agreed she needed an emergency Caesarean. She desperately wanted to hear her baby’s first cry, however.

“I want to enjoy it,” she begged.

So the senior surgeon, Mrs. Patel (this was in the U.K., where surgeons are addressed as “Mrs.” and “Mr.,” not “Dr.”), agreed to a spinal anaesthetic so Sharlene could be awake for the procedure. But when Mrs. Patel opened Sharlene’s uterus, her baby’s head was firmly stuck deep in her pelvis.

Mrs. Patel sign-languaged me to push upwards in Sharlene’s vagina. But the baby wouldn’t budge, regardless of how hard I pushed or how hard the surgeon pulled.

Mrs. Patel and I didn’t have time to think how babies like this used to die.

We just got on with trying to sort things out.

The baby was—eventually—unwound from his mother’s pelvis.

Sharlene might have enjoyed her baby’s first cry—but Mrs. Patel and I didn’t notice. Because just before that moment, Sharlene started to bleed.

Not a little bleed, but torrential. From more and then visibly more sites.

Directed by yet more sign language, I started pressing down on some of the worst bleeders while Mrs. Patel took over trying to sort out the others.

We didn’t notice how high the blood-soaked pile of swabs was rising until the scrub nurse clicked her lips and blinked—sign-languaged us to keep the bloody mountain out of Sharlene’s view.

Sharlene groaned, “You’re squashing my belly, you’re hurting me!”

Then she started hiccuping—and spilling arm-lengths of guts out of her abdomen.

Women used to die in situations like this. I couldn’t think about how sometimes they still do.

I pressed down even harder. I thought, “Yeah, I’m squashing you. We’re trying to save your life.”
The bleeding just didn’t stop.

I could see Mrs. Patel thinking, grim-faced, about an emergency hysterectomy—what you need to do if you can’t control bleeding.

But somehow Mrs Patel did just that, hardly breathing till she’d sorted it all out. This is when surgeons earn their money.

Sharlene’s only grumbles were how long she’d had to wait to hold her perfect baby.

But let’s not forget that births can be difficult for doctors too.

Caroline Mawer
London, England, United Kingdom

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Comments

1 thought on “Let’s Not Forget the Doctors”

  1. Yehudit Reishtein

    Thank God for dedicated nurses and doctors who persist as one disaster leads to another disaster without giving up, and manage to save two lives in the process. I held my breath throughout your story, and was there with you in the room. ]Sharlene may not realize how lucky she was in her caregivers, but your readers certainly do.

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