And to Him we all return

I have to read the case again tomorrow, for the sake of complicity. 
If I can, I will update this entry.







Now that I'm sitting here in front of the computer, word fails me.

Hmm. Okay.
There's nothing much to tell, really. And I don't know much of the situation to begin with.

I did a CPR today.
Yeay.

It's a great experience I suppose. Here we are, with no clue and just following the afternoon ward round when the patient they were reviewing was in asystole. Immediately they put the bed barriers down, call the staff to bring cardiac monitor, people moving smartly here and there busily. To the patient directly opposite of us, he could have no clue on the urgency that has developed in front of him.

Ms S, the head of surgical department herself was there. She was like the captain of the ship, standing at the end of the bed, hands on the bed end and giving instructions to her doctors and housemen. The housemen were all beside the bed, 4 of them, and they start to resuscitate the patient.

The patient had underwent two endoscopy procedure for an upper GI bleed. He was an elderly Chinese man with history of hypertension and hypercholestrolaemia, among many others. From what I gathered, his blood pressure had dropped, he had acidosis, and also multiple organ failure. I will update the full case tomorrow, if I can.

This is taken from Ministry of Health Malaysia's CPG of Management of Acute STEMI 2014, 3rd edition. After the 1st epinephrine injection, the MO offered us to join and do CPR. We had to wear gloves and mask beforehand. And we did.

It's amazingly eerie how so far apart the comparison doing a CPR on a dummy and doing it on a real human being. His body was so delicate and so fragile the first HO who did CPR already broke his rib cage. Well, it's very expected anyway. I'm just surprised it was that easy.

And when it's my turn to do it it's hard to control yourself without self-judging your action. Is what I'm doing is right? And the bed shook so much from the chest compression I couldn't be sure it was me who was shaking. Looking at his face is so much scarier, to tell you the truth. Forget about Hollywood moments where the heroes always look at the victim's face and savagely say, "wake up, damn you." It's really, really not like that at all.

After 3rd injection and close to 30 minutes of resuscitation, we had to accept that he had indeed passed away. Then the world continues like usual, the people in the ward continuing their work because although someone just died, life for the others just simply, goes on. The MO then gave the bad news to the relative and they accepted his fate as bravely as they could.

Then I decided it's enough for today, took my things and drove home.
Life goes on and to Him all of us will return, indeed.