Monday, March 06, 2006

Time For The Cardiac Kid To Grow Up

So, let's get right to the point. None of that usual waffle. Last week I experienced my first carrdiac arrest. Far from the nicest experience of my life in fact one of the worst. I am just glad that the patient was fine. Now you may be picturing a nice environment with cool, calm, experienced doctors all around. However no, this all happened in a small room with 4 people, myself, an experienced technician, a medical student and the patient. Still, far better than this happening in the street granted. After much thought on the subject, as you might expect, I have come to the conclusion that I did pretty well, all things considered. After the initial shock I stayed calm and managed to be as helpful as possible to my collegue who did all the real work. Doctors arrived later with the patient in a more stable condition and after followed a lenghty period of monitoring before transfer to a ward. Well it's not really possible to explain my feeling when the whole thing kicked off except to say it now seems possible for one's heart to both leap and drop at the same time. So, next time you have a glass in your hand raise a glass to defibrillation. Ok?