Behind Closed Door

We had just entered into the early beginning of the first month of the year...😅. I really did not know but somehow, suddenly without warning, we had been hit by the "tsunami" in the early month of January! 😱.

Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way. The Lord be with you all. - 2 Thessalonians 3:16

Before I go further, let me explain... :) It's not meaning to say being hit by the real tsunami wave...😆. But, it's just only a "description" of how really chaotic is at the moment! We usually have this "trend" so, me and my colleagues always say...

"We have been hit by the tsunami!"

"It's like we're going to the war!"

So, that's how really a busy, messy, crazy and chaos is when the situation becomes absolute madness and, is really playing havoc with the usual working schedule. To be honest, there will be a day that goes haywire, erratic and out of control which is all happened solely behind that closed door!

I remembered, on that particular day... I was just entered my shift and, I could already feel the atmosphere or an aura of the unseen energy that had surrounded us and seemed to be generated by the place.

We were almost full house and most of the patients were critically ill and, many of them were on ventilator support machine. I was assigned to taking care of a patient who also on a ventilator with high dose of inotropes which were needed to be titrated each time according to the vital signs on the monitor. However, the blood pressure was very labile 😥.

Not long after, we received a call from the operation theatre (OT) room and was telling that they wanted urgent ICU bed now as there was a patient who had done operation and, was being monitored in the recovery room, suspected to had developed a stroke after operation. So, to us it was obviously an emergency!

Hence, my team needed to create an ICU bed now no matter how busy we were and still we needed to moved a bed for the patient who was going to be transferred in to our ICU soon.

Although me and my colleagues, where each one of us had other patients who were also under our care, we were still needed to worked as a team to arranged things fast and, to made sure a complete bed was available for the urgent case.

Within minutes, the patient arrived and came in with an external fixation device of the left foot and ankle. We noticed that the patient had right side body weakness and, with a stridor breathing sound. We immediately knew that the patient was not in a good condition 😰. But, after discussion with the family, they agreed on the transferring the patient to other hospital for further treatment.

Without delay, our anaesthetist straight away intubated the patient for an airway protection before being transferred to other hospital. So now, all other things needed to be done very quickly... These included all the doctor's reports, medical and blood tests reports, medication prescriptions, referral letter, nurse's reports and so on... Everything needed to be done instantly and well-prepared before sending the case. It all happened so fast and within a short amount of time, the case transferred to other hospital 🙏.

Actually, we had just settled down a bit... Suddenly, my patient's monitor gave an alarm and showed the blood pressure dropped, then followed by the heart rate...😨. I quickly titrated up the inotropes to increased the blood pressure and immediately informed the doctor in charge of the patient. However, after a deep discussion among the family members and, eventually they agreed for DNAR.

Not long after that, the patient's blood pressure dropped further, then later the heart rate slowed down or bradycardia and, subsequently the SpO2 unrecordable. Now, all I heard were some noises made by the alarm sounds from the ventilator machine and the monitor. Then, it was literally at 8.45 pm, the monitor showed asystole... The family members were around and allowed to be with the deceased for the last time.

Approximately, 15 minutes before I finished my duty at 9.00 pm... There was a moment of silence. Eventually, everything went quiet 🙏.

Anyway, I sometimes do find how fast the time flies... It's surprising how quickly my shift has nearly come to an end, but still the work has not been done yet. Hence, I need to hand over to the next shift after I completed my task. The truth is things happened everyday.. It is never-ending.

Trouble and distress have come upon me, but your commands give me delight. - Psalm 119:143

I know that there will be lots of things happen in a shift with different stories one at a time. Thus, being outside and only seeing the plain wooden brown door is not always the same as to compare to all the things that occurred behind the closed door.

So anyway, I think that was how I ended my work duty or shift on that particular day... An unexpected story or sudden event one at a time.