At work this weekend I found myself "CRN" (the nurse who runs around and puts out fires) while I was awaiting my patient's return form surgery. About mid morning I got a call from another hospital saying that they were sending a critical patient our way. We prepared as much as we could for his arrival, setting up 12 different IV drips, ordering ventilators, etc...
The patient arrived in terrible shape and went into cardiac arrest only minutes after he rolled in the door. Once again I found myself doing chest compressions on the middle bed of our only 3 bed room, which of course was full... Again with the sequence of CPR, shock, pulse comes back, lose it again, lather rinse and repeat. In midst of all of this, his family walks in (or rather runs in). "Daddy, daddy, come back," they screamed slapping his face. We continued to try but all of us knew it was futile. The attending physician, a small Asian woman, calmingly spoke to the family at the bedside explaining what was being done and that we were running out of options. Finally we stopped, but as soon as we did the man's daughter ran up and tried to do compressions. The son then started to beat on his father's chest and the entire family began to wail. The family was middle eastern and I'm sure that some this reaction was related to thier culture and I'm sure the suddenness of it all didn't help... The little Asian doctor bear hugged the son from behind while another nurse did the same with the daughter. Just like that, it was over.
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