Personal Narrative: The Emergency Room

“Code Blue, ER. Code Blue, ER”. I can still hear that calm, unalarmed voice over the intercom. Seconds later, John Doe, a 50-year-old male, is rushed in through the double doors of the Emergency Room with an EMT pounding on his lifeless chest. Although the medical staff had been preparing for some time, it still appeared like a scramble to resuscitate this man’s life. It was my first shift as a medical scribe; I had no idea what to expect. While paramedics shouted the jargon-filled report, the surrounding chaos was quieted by the physician who maintained the room's composure. The instant the pulse was obtained, I was overcome with a foreign feeling that can only be described as pure exhilaration as if the epinephrine injected into the patient manifested its effects on me.

Have you seen my husband? Is all my mom was shouting as she held my hand tightly, running back and forth through the hospital? A receptionist sent us to a room, which felt like coming into an isolated mausoleum. The cold air enveloped my entire body, ice has replaced my spine and numbness is all my fingers felt. The room was somber dark, dead silence; the only sound heard was the heart machine ... Beep … Beep. There wasn’t anything more traumatizing then seeing my father lain on the bed, unresponsive, tubes coming from out mouth and nose. The sadness and desperation in his eyes broke my heart. All of sudden the heart monitor went off with a loud buzzing sound. A nurse jumped out of nowhere “Code Blue”, in matter of seconds 4 nurses and a doctor surrounded my father, my mom and I mindset was at a shock, like were able to see what was happening but couldn’t do anything our body was some glued to the floor. The doctors and nurses tired to help my father but it was too late,

Clinical day started slow, I was a bit anxious about waking my patient up that morning but I knew I had to go in. I woke him slowly and took his vitals and proceeded with my assessment. As I assessed my patient, his wife came in to his room and I introduced myself. During the morning I found out that my patient was being discharged. Before discharge, my patient was going to be fitted for a LifeVest.

Back in 2009, when I first came to the United States, I had a terrifying experience. I just finished taking a shower when I suddenly felt out of breath and my heart was pounding fast. With my nursing background, I had to keep calm, drank water and sat down judging that it would soon be over. However, moments later, the symptoms still persisted. I did not exhibit any chest pain, but I knew something was amiss. Without delay, I phoned my aunt who was a critical care nurse and was told to go to ED right away. We dashed to the ED, with me struggling to walk because I had an extreme feeling of doom. Everything around me was a blur. I was so scared. My husband was in Baltimore. I was with my relatives visiting in North Carolina and my three kids were still in the Philippines. I felt like my life flashed before me. It was the most horrifying experience I have ever run into.

After about fifteen minutes, which was a protocol for attempting to resolve the death rhythm; flat-line or asystole, the doctor pronounced her dead and all resuscitation measures ceased. She never had a heart rhythm on the monitor; she was flat-lined the entire time. Weeping and afraid daughters waited in the consultation room where the doctor would deliver the devastating news that their mother was dead. Myself and the nurse left in the room preparing the patient for the family. The nurse had her back to me as she wrote her notes on the counter in a hurried state trying to get back to herding her cattle. I cared for the mother, respectful and tidying the area all along thinking her daughters will have one chance to see her before the finality

"I heard a whooshing sound in my ears," he told the doctor. "I felt like you feel when you go over a bump in a car going real fast and you feel your stomach drop out. The next thing I knew, I was in a room, crouched in a corner of the ceiling. I could see my body below me. . . . I could see doctors and nurses working on me. My doctor was there and so was Sandy, one of the nurses. I heard Sandy say ‘I wish we didn't have to do this.' I wondered what they were doing. I saw

The room was swarming. My heart raced as I watched. I had lost track of myself until the orders of a nurse brought me back. “Jack, grab the crash cart!” she exclaimed while performing compressions. I sprinted to the nurse’s station, grabbed the crash cart, and sprinted back. I retook my position and continued to watch. The patient regained her pulse only to lose it again minutes later. After an additional fifteen minutes of compressions she was back. Relief flooded my body. At the time I didn’t feel anything other than futility, the adrenaline seemed to have numbed most of my thoughts. Later that night I kept replaying the entire scene in my head. I could vividly remember the family crying outside, the efficiency with which the physicians worked, and a strong feeling of helplessness I felt at the time, wanting to help, but being unable to do so was infuriating. I could not stop thinking about. About a week later I came to the conclusion that what I had witnessed was something beautiful. Everyone in that room was dedicated to saving this person’s life. This was their job, and it was nothing short of heroism. Even more heartening was the humanity of it all. Witnessing those physicians, having dedicated their lives to be there at that moment to save this person’s life was truly inspiring.

I earned 14 hours for service for this activity. I continued working in my shift in the ICU. In the ICU, the main jobs are refilling the drawers in the not occupied rooms and ensuring that the supply closets are full. Sometimes, I clear the storage unit, that contains towels, sheets, pillow cases, and rags, from yarn. The yarn is used to tie the a stack of linen together and they are usually all over the place. If I get the chance, I throw out the excess yarn and untie the stacks. When I was doing this, a nurse thanked me because everyone is so busy and does not have time to clean up the yarn. I continued to do my jobs, but towards the end of my shift, I begin to become tired. I developed time efficient system that allowed me to maximize the

I had no idea where I was. Despite my blurred vision, I soon recognized the sound of an operating heart monitor machine. I tried to rub my eyes, but the wires connected to my arm restrained my movements. As I recovered my vision, I recognized the ICU room and my father standing beside me. He gently covered me, swallowed his tears, took a deep breath, and told me what had happened. While he was speaking, some moments of the incident gradually started coming to me, and it all began to make sense.

“ I need an ambulance quick, my son has stopped breathing,” I tried to say while holding back tears. The operator said that they will be at the house in 5-10 minutes. I sat back down on the couch and poured myself another glass of wine. All that was left was me and the silence of the house. No faint beeping of the oximeter or hissing of the ventilator, no felt presence of anyone in the house. Just me and the

My supervisor, one of the head nurses, hurriedly pulled me to the corner of the bleach white hospital room and directed me to put on gloves, an eye mask, and a face mask. I felt as if I was preparing for war as I put on all of the required gear. The sound of expensive shoes click-clacked down the hallway indicating the arrival of two doctors who rushed into the room and shouted out orders to the staff while pulling the doors to the room shut along with the curtains. Two doctors, eight nurses, an intern, and a dying patient squeezed into the already claustrophobic ten by fifteen-foot room. The machine monitoring the patient’s vital signs continued to beep incessantly as my heart rate accelerated. Throughout my internship, I had never seen a patient in critical condition until that moment. I remembered my teacher’s advice if we were ever in a situation such as this: take a few deep breaths and sit down if you feel like you’re going to pass out. In that

I was waiting on hold. His chest was rising and falling, so I knew he hadn't went into respiratory arrest. I began searching for a pulse when a woman's voice came through, "What is your emergency?"

I recently finished a round of rehab with Aaron Schauble at your Decatur location and before too much time passes, I wanted to be sure and send a note to you about my experience at the clinic. As a business owner myself, I know how much I appreciate constructive feedback and I want to give credit where credit is due.

7:00 A.M.- I remember walking into the hospital, noticing how soothing and pretty everything looked. “Why had I not noticed this before?” The lobby was very sleek looking, with blue, gray, and brown covered chairs. They were the slouchy kind of chairs, the kind you can sink down in while watching a football game. The walls were primarily a beautiful sea blue with a small amount of white trim that hugged all the doors. We walked to the elevator and pushed the button for the fourth floor. It seemed like an eternity to get to where we needed to be. I found myself staring at the inside of the elevator, noticing the red halo of light behind the floor buttons, the emergency call box boldly outlined in black, hearing the whirling gears of the elevators pulley system that seemed so loud. The elevator doors opened and one by one the passengers got off on their selected floors. “The fourth floor, it is finally here” I thought to myself. My husband and I looked at each other anxiously, this is it. I knew we were thinking the same thing. Our life changes now, and we couldn’t wait.

I never knew what it was like to have a normal heartbeat. I was your typical girl growing up that played with Disney princesses, loved pastel pink, and pranced around the house singing nursery rhymes at dawn. I would wake up every morning with a smile on my face and tell everyone and everything how much I loved them from my parents to my mini pink Barbie sofa that I adored. The world was beautiful and lovely, until I was thirteen years old. I was walking down the crowded and filthy streets of Times Square to a lavish five star hotel that rested on the corner of 45th and Broadway. I walked past the doorman whose hair was as white as snow to the elevator to go up to the 18th floor. I stepped inside of the elevator and clicked the circular yellow button which lit up with the touch of my finger. The elevator began to slowly glide slowly upwards towards my floor. The elevator then came to a sudden halt which took me by surprise. The lights went out. It was as dark as the night of halloween when the bats camouflage in the sky and there is no light to be seen not even from the old fashioned red brick houses decorated in cotton spider webs that lined the street of a tiny wealthy neighborhood in a large city. My entire body was jostled as if I was in the middle of an earthquake and I fell slowly to the ground like the wax melting from a candle. My heart began to thud. I could feel the blood pumping throughout my entire body. The sweat was dripping down my face like I just came out