A visit to the Emergency Room...
Feb. 6th, 2011 03:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsOmaha woke up this morning with severe abdominal pains, and when I asked her if she wanted to go to the ER, she said we should go without any hesitation. When that, I know the pain has to be nigh unto crippling for her, because she has a pain tolerance a mile high.
We arrived to find the place deserted. By the time I'd parked the car they'd gone through initial intake. I arrived just in time to hear, "Do you take any drugs? Does anyone hit you or hurt you?" I know, they have to ask those questions. I held my tongue rather than say, "Sigh Not recently. Does consensual sadomasochism count, anyway?"
The old lobby was straight out of the 70s, but the hospital had recently undergone a refit and the ER lobby was in that beautiful 21st-century woodtone paneling. Even better, the old ER, last visited when Kouryou-chan put a bead up her nose five years ago, was a cramped narrow set of hallways that branched without much rhyme or reason. The new ER was beautiful: A big open rectangle with four semi-private bays along each wall, and in the center a ringed command center with a glassed-in quiet area for physicians and staff. It was a heck of an admirable design.
I hepled Omaha get dressed before the nurse finally asked, "Are you her husband." Uh, yeah. They took samples from Omaha, then gave her a steroid, a muscle relaxer, and an opiate. She rested while we waited. They wheeled her over to an unspecified scanner, then wheeled her back. There wasn't much to do, I'm glad I brought a book.
While I was there, though, there was a voice screaming from down the hall. And while it wasn't a pleasant screaming, it didn't sound right to me. It sounded... practiced. Hollywood. It was the kind of sound you hear in B-movies as the zombies gnaw into a victim's intestines. Later, as I was waiting for Omaha to come back from the scanner, I heard the doctor talking to a nurse, and they were pointing in the direction the screaming had been coming from: a second section of ER, set off from the first. From the snippets of conversation I got, the screamer had been in the ER before, complaining of severe hip pain and barking like a dog. The physician said he suspected the guy was just here to score some free drugs. Later, I saw police officers roaming that hallway.
The final diagnosis was of a relatively small kidney stone that had gotten trapped at the end of the ureter, and would pass on its own in a matter of days, or so he said. A long list of long-genericized drugs was prescribed: an opiate, a steroidal anti-inflammatory, a smooth muscle relaxer, and an antibiotic in case the stone was struvite, which indicates an infection.
We got home four hours later. Omaha went straight to bed and I ran to the pharmacy to get her meds. She's sleeping now, and doing all right. I need coffee.
We arrived to find the place deserted. By the time I'd parked the car they'd gone through initial intake. I arrived just in time to hear, "Do you take any drugs? Does anyone hit you or hurt you?" I know, they have to ask those questions. I held my tongue rather than say, "Sigh Not recently. Does consensual sadomasochism count, anyway?"
The old lobby was straight out of the 70s, but the hospital had recently undergone a refit and the ER lobby was in that beautiful 21st-century woodtone paneling. Even better, the old ER, last visited when Kouryou-chan put a bead up her nose five years ago, was a cramped narrow set of hallways that branched without much rhyme or reason. The new ER was beautiful: A big open rectangle with four semi-private bays along each wall, and in the center a ringed command center with a glassed-in quiet area for physicians and staff. It was a heck of an admirable design.
I hepled Omaha get dressed before the nurse finally asked, "Are you her husband." Uh, yeah. They took samples from Omaha, then gave her a steroid, a muscle relaxer, and an opiate. She rested while we waited. They wheeled her over to an unspecified scanner, then wheeled her back. There wasn't much to do, I'm glad I brought a book.
While I was there, though, there was a voice screaming from down the hall. And while it wasn't a pleasant screaming, it didn't sound right to me. It sounded... practiced. Hollywood. It was the kind of sound you hear in B-movies as the zombies gnaw into a victim's intestines. Later, as I was waiting for Omaha to come back from the scanner, I heard the doctor talking to a nurse, and they were pointing in the direction the screaming had been coming from: a second section of ER, set off from the first. From the snippets of conversation I got, the screamer had been in the ER before, complaining of severe hip pain and barking like a dog. The physician said he suspected the guy was just here to score some free drugs. Later, I saw police officers roaming that hallway.
The final diagnosis was of a relatively small kidney stone that had gotten trapped at the end of the ureter, and would pass on its own in a matter of days, or so he said. A long list of long-genericized drugs was prescribed: an opiate, a steroidal anti-inflammatory, a smooth muscle relaxer, and an antibiotic in case the stone was struvite, which indicates an infection.
We got home four hours later. Omaha went straight to bed and I ran to the pharmacy to get her meds. She's sleeping now, and doing all right. I need coffee.
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-06 11:40 pm (UTC)ER visits are never fun. Here's hoping it works itself out with a minimum of pain for the lovely Omaha.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 05:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-06 11:58 pm (UTC)Pass on Well Wishes when she awakes :-)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 12:14 am (UTC)Hope Omaha feels better soon.
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Date: 2011-02-07 01:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 02:03 am (UTC)Yet the pain from the kidney stone had me begging someone to put me out of my misery.
My best wishes to her for a speedy recovery.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 08:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 06:16 am (UTC)A friend of mine used to get kidney stones, and for him knowing what the problem was reduced the pain significantly-- excruciating and scary was way worse for him than just excruciating.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 07:41 am (UTC)I was at the ER recently, they didn't ask me that. Instead, they asked me if I felt safe at home. Which I think is a better question.
There sure is a lot of illness going around so far in 2011. I've been to the ER for an ear infection, the first time I've been majorly ill for about 10 years. Brooke keeps getting various things, and Omaha is like the third or fourth LJ friend, at least, to get ill recently.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 06:36 pm (UTC)"Yes. ... Well... The stairs are a bit dodgy at the moment but I can handle it."
Got a little bit of a laugh out of the ER person.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 10:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 04:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 05:50 pm (UTC)Unfortunately, the 11-year-old had as much trouble sleeping as I did.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-08 09:08 am (UTC)