More nights!

Again I find myself on more night shifts. This is due to me being on what we call 'relief', we have relief weeks incorporated into our rota which covers annual leave and sickness. Most of the time we are put on night shifts and they never seem to follow any logical pattern, we are just there to fill in the gaps.

The last week hasn't been exactly busy or exciting but at least I have attended a small amount of needy patients. There has been the usual mix of drunk and overdose patients with a sprinkling of regular fallers for good measure.
After attending a couple of patients suffering from MI's (heart attacks) I have become a little fed up, I mean they didn't even have the decency to have an MI that I could Thrombolyse! I don't know, some people eh.

One of the better jobs I went to was a guy in his 30's who thought it might be a good idea to start weight training again...............................at home. The job came in as a GP admission (urgent journey) stating that the patient had back pain. His initially sympathetic partner briefed us about what had happened and showed us the GP's letter. I say initially sympathetic because soon after we arrived and started giving him Entonox she thought he was a bit of a light weight and was playing on his pain. She then started comparing his back pain to 'man flu'. By this point we were all laughing, even the patient. However he was clearly in genuine agony. The GP had queried a prolapsed disc and had refered the patient to the orthopaedic surgeons. His partner said that she had started exercising recently and had joined the local gym, he on the other hand opted for a bit of DIY weight training and put his back out soon after starting. Two Drs had visited over the course of the evening and had given the patient a whole array of pain killers including Diazepam, Paracetamol, Ibuprofen, codeine and even a 100 mg Tramadol injection. In fact the patient was convinced that the Dr must have injected him with water as it had absolutely no effect. He was also surprised that the Dr didn't have any Entonox.
It was time to move him on to the carry chair and get him down stairs. The Entonox was doing the trick up to this point but when he moved, the air turned blue. After a back breaking carry down the stairs we got him on to the vehicle. Back on the Entonox but this time it wasn't as effective so I asked if he wanted anything stronger, I already knew what the reply was going to be. I started with 5mg of Morphine which just started to take the edge off but gave him another 5mg which made him a lot more comfortable. The last thing he needed was to be bounced about in agony on the way into hospital. I think his partner was especially impressed when we, including the patient, said to her that women simply don't understand what us men have to go through. She rolled her eyes and laughed. Good job, nice couple.