Falling for an Angel

Without a doubt, I have one of the most interesting yet stressful preoccupations in the world. It's a dirty job that someone's got to do and I happen to be one of those who have to deal with the messy business of emergency medical care.

One crazy day, we started out long before the sun was up. We had an inter-facility, critical care transfer for a patient who suffered a heart attack. It had already been a challenging day before that and my back was hurting from continuously performing CPR on a patient who fell unconscious while being loaded into the ambulance. Unfortunately, despite our efforts, I lost the patient at the ER of a private hospital. I had watched his vital signs fade away while doctors and staff were doing their best to save his life.

I was watching the wife break into tears when the doctor explained that they did all they can but it was just her husband's time to go. I watched the ER buzzing with activity and I noticed a bed with a body bag waiting to be transferred to the morgue. I saw all these while waiting for the staff to release our stretcher on which the patient lay when he expired. When all the machines were removed, the nurses indicated that we could claim our gurney but we had to help transfer the corpse for "bagging".

Being in the midst of a pandemic doesn't make our job any easier. We barely get a wink of sleep before we have to go back out again. What makes our jobs more difficult is the fact that hospitals are filled up and even the hallways of the ER and driveways are strewn with patients on makeshift bunks and "monoblock" chairs, tethered to 50-lb oxygen tanks. Going "shopping" or running around looking for a hospital which would take in our patient has become the norm and it drains the life out of us.

So, there we were in the lobby of a hospital which specializes in heart diseases with the patient under our care. The medical resident on duty (MROD) that morning confronted the wife of the patient and explained the dire situation the hospital is in, and that her husband would be admitted into the "Kubid ER" until it can be determined that he didn't get the "bug" in his system. The wife was so distressed by what the doctor relayed to her and suddenly had second thoughts if she would consent to leaving her husband in a roomful of "zombies".

I had to explain to the lady that this was the situation all over the metropolis and she was lucky that a hospital of that stature would accept her husband at all. Our doctor-on-board had already assured her that the imminent threat to her husband's life is his ticker and not "the bug". I also made the lady realize that fear is going to kill them more than "the bug" would. After about half an hour of contemplating, she heeded our advice and was thankful for our efforts to put some order amidst her family's chaotic situation.

The sun was already high in the sky when I finally got to hit the sack but it would be another restless "night" for me. I had barely an hour's sleep when another call came.

We had barely endorsed the patient when we had to run off to another call late that afternoon. It was supposed to have been a "coordinated" conduction but when we got to the hospital that the client chose, my jaw dropped when I saw the condition of the ER!

We had already warned the client that this would happen but it was too late. The patient was experiencing difficulty in breathing and his oxygen saturation was already well below acceptable levels which ideally should be 95-99%. The patient's O2 saturation hovered in the 48-56% mark! His lips and nails were turning cyanotic but he still refused to wear the oxygen mask and since we were on "high-flow" we were also draining the tanks three times faster.

Since we were looking at another transfer, I knew that our O2 supply was going to go flat before we could even get a few kilometers from where we were so I had to find a way to cadge a 50-pounder just so we could stretch our supply for at least a one-way run to the destination hospital.

We barely had any lunch and it was already past 9PM when our team brought us some burgers and fries. Just as we were about to finish our meal, a car pulled up on the driveway and a lady jumped out and frantically called for help. Apparently, there was a patient who suffered a cardiac arrest and lay unconscious in the cramped vehicle. The patient was a big guy and the ER staff had a difficult time extricating him from the vehicle. 

At that point, my partner, Alfred exclaimed, "Putangina, CODE! I'm going to help them!"

"Not without me, you're not!" 

And we both ditched our burgers, slapped on nitrile gloves, donned our masks and jumped out of the ambulance and helped pull the patient out of the vehicle and onto a gurney while the doctor jumped over the 300-plus pound man and started chest compressions. This patient would also expire.

After all that excitement, our patient's sister called me and told me to go to another government hospital where the patient's doctor was a consultant. Keeping in mind that we were low on oxygen supply, we practically flew the ambulance from Manila to Quezon City in less than half an hour!

Every hospital has a "triage" area where patients are screened before being admitted. In this particular hospital, there was this little booth set up like a guard house and the only lit structure in the dark parking area. Looking at it, I thought it would be spooky to be alone in there especially at night! It was about an hour before midnight when we arrived and there was a solitary nurse-on-duty (NOD) in that booth.

I slowly approached and the lady behind the counter motioned for me to talk through an opening in the plastic cover which was draped around the booth. As I bent down to the aperture, I saw her eyes and they instantly drew me to her! I immediately apologized for not making an "advance call" prior to our arrival and explained our situation. 

She politely interrupted and also explained the situation that I already knew--that they would have no available beds, considering the critical state that our patient was in. I said I do understand but maybe there was an offhand chance that she could help me out. 

As she turned to speak, a car pulls into the driveway and a couple jumps out pleading that they be let in because there was an elderly lady in the back seat who was fading away. Not long after that, another car pulls up and again, the driver gets out and also pleads to the NOD to attend to his relative immediately! She glanced at me at I glanced back, not saying a word. Amidst the commotion, I slowly disappeared into the darkness and waited until the cars had taken off. 

I was watching her deal with the situation. Both those patients were lifeless and were likely "Codes" or Code Blue status--medical jargon for the act of resuscitating or reviving an unconscious patient through CPR, defibrillation or electric shock. 

I could see that she was close to tears and it was breaking her heart to turn away patients but that's just how fucked up the hospital situation is. I waited for her to get back to her station before emerging from the dark. Slowly I walked up to her again and never said a word. We just looked at each other and she said, "Naiiyak ako!"

I stayed silent a little longer and then I said, "Hinga ka muna, miss. Magusap tayo kapag okay ka na." 

And she looked at me again and our eyes locked into each other and I felt her smile underneath her mask and then she said, "Panong gagawin natin sa patient n'yo, sir?"

That's when I started negotiating and dropped a name and she picked up the phone and spoke to whoever was in charge. When she put down the phone she said, "Okay na sir, coordinated na. Puwede niyo nang ibaba yung patient."

She brought over a wheelchair and we helped the patient onto it. "Puwede ba akong sumama sa 'yo?" I insisted.

"Oo naman!" she said.

"What's your name, miss?" I asked.

She replied, "Angel."

"It's nice to meet you, Angel! Gusto kitang maging friend!" I said to her.

"Likewise, sir!" she replied.

And so, we got our business done and the patient was safely transferred and endorsed into the ward. I looked around and Angel wasn't there anymore and I thought I had missed my chance. When Alfred and I rolled the gurney down the ramp, she reappeared and was spraying alcohol around her. Delighted by the sight, I called out, "Angel!" and she turned around.

I told her that I was serious when I said I'd like for us to be friends and she replied, "Ako din, sir!"

So, I flipped over the patient chart and handed it over to her, asking for her Facebook profile and she scribbled her full name on the blank piece. I cannot put into words the joy I felt at the moment!

Yes, it's a crazy job that I'm in. It's so easy to "lose it" if you don't make an effort to keep your sanity. Meeting wonderful people like Angel is one reason I still get up in the morning.