SILENT EPIDEMIC
The gurney blasted through the emergency room doors, while Robert Grady, M.D., straddled the lifeless patient, applying CPR. Dr. Danny Evans rushed to the racing gurney and accompanied the crowded rolling table to the trauma room.
“What have you got?" he yelled to the paramedics who had fallen behind so that doctors could take over the life saving process.
“White female, approximately twenty-five, deep lacerations on both wrists, BP is eighty over sixty.” The paramedic ran the complete list of the patient’s vitals while the staff continued to work on the unconscious woman. Her wrists had been sliced with great precision, with three perfectly executed cuts on her left side, and one on her right. There had been an enormous amount of blood loss.
“Get her typed and bring in five units, now," Evans yelled.
“We’re losing her," Grady warned. “Her pressure is dropping."
“V tack," a nurse announced as a high pitch sounded from a monitoring device. The green flat line followed. The woman’s shirt was ripped open.
“Give me one fifty," Evans yelled.
“One fifty," the nurse confirmed.
“Clear." Everyone moved from the patient, as the jolt forced the woman’s body to jump slightly. The high pitch continued. “Two hundred. Clear." Again, the body jumped. The whining sound of the monitoring device was steady and deafening. “Two fifty. Clear." The body defied the machine. “We’re going in," Evans announced, as a nurse handed him a scalpel. The woman’s chest was sliced and opened quickly, while Evans forced his will into the lifeless heart. The rest of the hospital staff watched helplessly.
“She’s been down too long," Grady said, mostly to himself.
“Adrenaline," Evans ordered, ignoring his colleague’s prediction of doom. The doctor continued to massage the woman’s heart, as the minutes ticked by.
“She’s gone," Grady stated. But Evans couldn’t let this woman go quite yet. She was too young to have her life end there in the emergency room.
“Not on my watch," he yelled to the lifeless form, and continued to work on her while the rest of the staff stood back. They were waiting for Dr. Danny Evans to draw his own obvious conclusion.
The woman had been lying on her living room floor bleeding out for an hour before her roommate had found her and dialed 911. Her long brown hair was caked with the blood that had seeped into the carpet. The staff looked down on her sympathetically as her body lay, unmoving, but disposed to the will of her doctor. She appeared to be at peace, as Evans forcefully worked to bring her back.
“She was so beautiful,” a nurse sighed. Except for the slices on her wrists and the bloodstains, her body was flawless. There were no other notable markings, except for a small butterfly tattoo on her left shoulder.
“Do you want me to call it?” Dr. Grady asked quietly. Danny Evans ignored the suggestion, and continued his battle with death.
“Not on my watch," he repeated. The staff stood by, sadly resolved.