Tis the season...

I can't believe it's February, and I'm only getting round to writing this post now. 

I've been planning to write about my festive on call adventures since before the shifts even happened! A mixture of exhaustion, real life and an interview have prevented that from happening. But here we are, it's a balmy evening in Matat and I've finally set aside the time to jot down some of my thoughts. 

Christmas morning started in a fairly normal way - presents and croissants. My neighbours had us (Andy and myself who were the chosen two on call for Christmas) round to open presents with their kids which was a delight. Hypothesising with a three year old about how we could possibly have slept through Santa's visit is a favourite memory. 

The day got off to a great start with the absolute dream team of nurses on with us. Senior nurses with years of experience, new nurses with enthusiasm and energy, and a back catalogue of Christmas hits playing in the duty room, we were flying. 

The first patient died at lunchtime. Mid 30's, she tested positive for HIV on arrival. She hadn't known before. Abdominal pain, hypovolaemic shock and acute renal failure - we assumed acute as she hadn't been in hospital before so no bloods to check. Fluid resuscitation commenced - she went into overload after 750ml. Her physiology was all over the place. Something was killing her, but so was the treatment. We tried in vain to resuscitate her after bellowing down the phone to ambulance control that she should have been transferred out earlier. It was all futile. She died with her mother watching. 

The stabbings started around mid afternoon. Some superficial cuts to lanky teenagers first. Then they got more severe, and more worrying as the sun began to set. By midnight we were on full damage control. I was numbering patients in the corridor and wrestling the drunk ones in to seats so I could assess them. 

8 chest drains. 

Two stabbed in the eyes. 

Four dead on arrival. 

48 hours later another one found himself in the referral hospital having a laparotomy for a perforated colon. 

I despair. 

Families were screaming at me that they hadn't been seen in 3 hours. I shouted back that I hadn't been to the toilet in 8. (Inappropriate but it made them sit down - my goal, really). 

At 0400 we both hid in my car and ate a full packet of gummy bears in silence. Hectic work, but thrilling. 

In amongst the chaos, a woman in her 50s presented with joint pain. She'd been diagnosed with arthritis 15 years before. She'd had the same pain for 15 years. She chose 1900 on Christmas Day to come in for a chat. It took all my strength and professionalism not to read her the riot act. 

By the grace of God, no caesareans were required that day. The rota meant that one doctor was 'on call' for casualty. Reality meant that two doctors worked constantly (with the exception of a frenzied run to the petrol station for snacks, and a 15 minute trip home to bring in the Christmas Lunch for everyone) from 0800 on 25th December until 0800 26th December. 

The day team coming in on Boxing Day stood back and laughed at the two corpses collapsed into chairs (me and Andy). We were done. One of the nurses (an absolute hero) took the suture packs out of our hands and put the bilateral chest drains into the bleeding 22year old in resus himself. 

I collapsed into bed at 0845 and didn't wake again until 1700. (At which time I put my glad rags on and had the nurses from Christmas Day's hectic shift round for drinks) - I was tired, but never too tired for wine. 

Christmas Day lunch with the Theatres gang

The Christmas Day dream team - we made up for it on Boxing night!