The first thing you notice about
Colin’s flat is the smell, a rank and cloying cheesiness that immediately has
you panting through your mouth like a dog. The second are the many squares of
paper stuck over the walls and cupboard doors – crudely handwritten slogans: You don’t have to be mad to work here but it
helps and I’m about to go nuckin’
futs and The floggings will continue
until morale improves, and so on.
In one alcove is a tall, black bookcase, each shelf given over to a fussy
collection of figurines: the first two, native Americans, the next, witches and
warlocks, the next elves and faeries, the very top shelf taken up by three wax
skulls, one of them horned. Each shelf has a handwritten notice: You can look but do NOT touch. Each time
Colin has written it, he’s made some kind of mistake and crossed it out furiously,
until the very last notice on the top shelf beneath the skulls which, from here
at least, looks relatively neat and clean.
Colin is rocking backwards and
forwards in an old rocking chair, his filthy white towelling robe gaping open across
a distended, waxy white abdomen, the scar of an old laparotomy straining like
the zip on an overstuffed bag. Colin is talking as we come into the room, an
excitable jabbering that would be surprising at any time of day; at three o’clock
in the morning, in this stinking, airless room, it’s quite overwhelming.
‘Six point three it was! Six point
three! So I checked it again and blow me, it was down a point! I’ve kept a
record of the tests for the past few weeks – look! Here! That’s me, there! It’s
never usually that up and down, so I was very confused by that. I’d just
finished watching my DVD and I thought – hey! I don’t feel right. So I got my
kit out and gave it a bash, and look – see? How it’s up and down? I’ve had some
food and something to drink. I’ve done my injections exactly as I’m supposed
to. So how d’you account for it? Or is it just me? Have I got completely the
wrong end of the stick? I ‘spect you think I’m I right old duffer. Hey? Hey?’
Luckily, Rae’s attending. She drops straight
in to get-out-quick mode, each question direct and sharply illuminating, like
an emergency beacon that starts to flash as soon as it hits the water.
We’re out of the flat in five
minutes. Even the lift smells sweet.
*
Nerys the pat nurse looks at me and
shakes her head as I’m cleaning up in the triage area.
‘That’s the third dreadful patient
you’ve brought me tonight,’ she says. ‘What did I ever do to you?’
She’s right. I do feel bad.
The first was a disruptive mental
health patient, who ended up charging round the department knocking things
over, or standing stock-still and freaking everyone out with a weird smile; the
second was a creepy drunk guy with neck pain who made inappropriate comments from
where he lay immobilised on his trolley.
‘They gave us grief, too,’ I
tell her. ‘Don’t forget, that first patient tried to throw herself out of the
ambulance and I spent the whole time wrestling with her in the back. And neck
pain guy, we had to immobilise him in his dodgy flat, listen to him for an hour
whilst we waited for back-up, then carry him down four flights of stairs. And
he wasn’t light.’
‘Yeah? Am I supposed to feel sorry
for you? At least you get to drop them off and walk out. We have to sit with
them for hours.’
She’s got a point. That’s one
benefit of working on the ambulance. You get limited exposure to the difficult
patients.
‘I’ll make it up to you,’ I tell her.
‘How exactly?’
‘I’ll think of something.’
‘Yeah? I can’t wait to hear it.’
At four o’clock in the morning,
she may be waiting a while.
8 comments:
I've got to be honest Spence,I think I'd be more worried as a Triage nurse (if that's the term) if you brought me someone who appeared perfectly fine.
Some nights scream 'twilight zone'.
How about a nice cup of tea and biscuits?
jack - You're right. I suppose what you want is someone who's pleasantly ill - or neatly distressed.
tpals - That night was definitely an episode!
anon - We made her a cup of tea earlier in the shift, and tea is definitely the default option. They've already got plenty of digestives in the tea room, but maybe a box of something more interesting (although it'd probably everyone BUT the nurses who'd end up scarfing them). :) p s Am I right in thinking you are a nurse?
And don't forget the other patients who have to put up with the creepers as well. The nurses get to bustle in and out, but we have to SIT with them. Awkward.
Definitely. I always feel sorry for the other patients who have to put up with it. Cubicle curtains don't cover much (and voices not at all) :/
Two things in hospital are pointless - doctors thinking that if they shut the curtains it's more private. And the hospital gowns with gaping holes in the back!!
I always get on very well with ambulance crews, we end up talking shop!
Absolutely! But I suppose there's nothing much to be done about either of those things, the curtains or the gowns.
I hope you don't have to go in very often, PH, but when you do, it must be nice to catch up with the crews (and have your ear chewed about standby &c) :/
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