Nurses Are Phenomenal

Wealthy Nations (including US and UK) have taken responsibility
for preserving 80% of the world's forested land in Brazil, Congo, and Indonesia,
They are on life support.

A scuffle of racing steps approached my room. My heart monitor read 21. Two nurses burst through the door, ready to restart my heart if it stopped. They looked at the monitor; now reading 32. One put her hands on her hips, shook her platinum bob, and said, “You need a pacemaker!” The three of us laughed and the monitor shot up to 41. 

 

Getting a pacemaker was the reason an ambulance had brought me from ER to the hospital at 7:15 pm Friday October 15. The question now was ‘When would I get it?’ It could be as early as 5:00 am or as late as … no one knew.

  

Nurses are phenomenal. While in ER a stream of caring nurses and paramedics, following the anthem BE PREPARED, took my vitals, put paddles on my chest and back, inserted two IVs in my right arm – one to keep me hydrated and the second in case they needed to restart my heart. Checking on me continuously, they explained that I had heart block, not a heart attack, meaning the upper and lower chambers of my heart were not communicating as they should. Later they reported that a doctor had ordered a pacemaker and an ambulance was scheduled. Each of them came to say goodbye when shifts changed, further instilling trust that I was in good hands.

At 2:15 pm on Saturday, October 16 the doctor who would be implanting the pacemaker appeared. He reported that the uncertain time was because it was now the weekend with fewer staff and the ‘cath lab’ where he would do his work had to give priority to urgent cases. Getting a pacemaker was considered an elective procedure so depending on what happened in the immediate future, we might be next ... or not.

After listening carefully to my two-year litany of incidents that prefigured the current heart block, he replied there was no guarantee that the pacemaker would end my episodes - there might be some other cause. But this would make my heart functional. He explained that he would make an incision below my left collar bone, thread two wires through an artery into the right atrium and right ventricle, install a small computer under the incision, attach the wires, check to be sure the computer worked properly, close the incision, apply super glue, and then take some tests to be sure the wires were where they should be.

Ten minutes after he left, I was greeted by the cath lab nurse – another caring professional who took all my vitals and explained the sleeping medicine that would prevent me from feeling the doctor’s work. As she wheeled me down to the surgical theatre, I learned that she was named for an Indian goddess. Was I lucky?

Under the rubric of BE PREPARED, fresh paddles were put on my chest and back in case they needed to restart my heart, and (overcoming my objection) an IV was put into my left arm in case the doctor needed to insert contrast to be able to better see where he was putting the wires. My objection was that for 24 years I had followed orders from a mastectomy doctor not to have any procedures done on the left arm because 11 lymph nods had been removed. Okay, I want this procedure to go well. Do what you have to do. 

 

I fell asleep as my left chest was anointed with a surface antibiotic, awakening later to the feeling of the pacemaker being pressed into my chest. Soon I heard the doctor joking about football with the technicians who had operated the X-ray machines and computer set up. I knew then that the hard part was over; they were relaxing after two hours of tension.

 

Three hours later, a friend picked me up to spend the night with her before going home to begin life as a pacemaker fortified 82-year-old. It would be two more days before I recognized the lady in red and named my pacemaker Clarissa. You will meet the lady in red in my next blog. 

I appreciate what it means to be on life support.