Very Strange ER Story!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

It was my weekend to work, and I got a STAT (immediate) call to ER Saturday night.

As I went running through the halls, I heard one of the paramedics tell one of the nurses that the patient’s name was Jason Craig, and that he’d been in an auto accident.

My son’s name is Jason and our last name is Craig, and my legs turned to rubber when I heard that! I have often had a phobia of having to work on my own son, and this just brought me up short.

It turned out that it was another Jason Craig, and although it put my mind at ease about my own son, I thought about how this could have happened to Jason Christopher, and now it has brought me closer tp Jason Elliot and some Craigs I never thought I’d meet.

Jason Elliot is going to be just fine. He had a perforated duodenum, but he’s a strong young’un and he’s gonna recover.

Never been so afraid, y’all!

Q

2

Damn, I’d have probably fainted upon hearing the name! Yay for your Jason, and especially for you, that it wasn’t him, and a hearty Get Well Soon for the unfortunate Jason it was.

Are you going to feel semi-obligated to go back and check up on the kid now?

3

I know a number of ER docs who have been called to work on their own kid. Scary stuff. I know one who was working when his kid came in DOA.

4

Back when I was a lab tech, I got to take blood from my own mother. That was extremely strange - I can’t imagine how it would be to work on your own flesh and blood. (On the plus side, because it was me taking her blood, I knew that she got a very good stick. :D)

5

Hmmm, funny that. My mom is a nurse and she used to take my blood all the time. I think she got extra joy from sticking me. She was never gentle about it. :slight_smile:

~J

6

Closest I ever got was plating my Aunt’s sputum culture when she was in the hospital. Not something you really want to talk about much. :slight_smile:

7

Whoa! Scary stuff indeed Quasi. Very glad it wasn’t your son. Did you tell him about it? If yes, how did he react.

If that happened to me I would be giving Annie the biggest hug of her life as soon as I saw her again.

8

I worked my way through undergrad and one of the jobs was at a funeral home for two years. I’d put on a suit and show families back to the room and then stay overnight to answer the phone in call anyone passed away.

One night I got a call and started taking down the information:

White male, 21 years old… hmmm, same as me.
Exact same first name, middle name, and last name just a letter off… woah.
Exact same birthday… I mean the very same day.
Almost identical, weight, height, etc.

I went down to the room where they were getting him ready for embalming. He’d been drinking at the lake just a few hours earlier and then dove off a dock and never came up. To stand there and picture the parallels and imagine myself lying there was strange indeed.

9

(Grrrrr… hit submit instead of preview)

Still, strange as the experience was, I’m sure it pales in comparison to the prospect of hearing a relative’s name mentioned, especially that of your child. My guess would be, Quasi, that your boy got a big hug that night when you got home.

10

I hope a little humor is okay.

During college I worked as a night call Lab Tech at a small hospital. Also had to days on the weekends.

So one Saturday afternoon, in comes a couple wanting their blood drawn for a premarital Hinton (syphilis screener). I could have told them to come back during the week, but what the hell, it was slow.

So, I sat 'em down in those student chairs we had in that part of the lab. You know those things. They have a little built-in table on your right, to write upon, prop a book on, etc. The chairs were about a yard or so apart, facing each other.

Okay.

So I draw the blood from the guy, and then start with the woman. Got about half of a redcap tube-ful when out of the corner of my eye, I see the guy, still seated in the chair, but now starting to keel over. (No shame here. Some people pass out over things like this.)

I whipped the needleout of the woman, tossed everything in the lab basket and caught the guy just before he fell to the floor.

Just as I got him propped up, there goes his fiancee into a faint. I rush to her, prop her up, the guy starts keeling over again.

I run back to him, and by now I’m laughing my ass off, wishing there was someone else who could see this uproariously funny farce playing out.

I had to run back and forth a couple of times more and finally got 'em both into our blood donor room - which was very close by - and managed to get each of them lying down on separate cots until they recovered.

Made my day.

11

You should have just shoved one of the chairs to the other so your syncoptic duo would be self-supporting. :smiley:

12

That’s probably what I did do - before getting them into the donor room. :stuck_out_tongue:

It’s been a long time - late 50’s, early 60’s - so I don’t remember all the details.

13

Aw, geez, Quasi, what a scary thing! I’m SO glad it wasn’t your son.