today, due to last minute scans (MRI friday at the hospital i guess) for some of my patients, i had some spare time in the morning. so ended up seeing another patient with my clinical supervisor and another fellow student.
the new patient we saw was a 50 odd year old male who had a stroke a few days ago. when we first saw him, he was lying in bed and was not able to express himself - he could not speak, although i think he could understand what we said, and his face was quite expressionless, almost a mask. i found it pretty hard to give instructions to him cos his face was just so expressionless and he just wasn't talking. try talking to a wall and you'll start to get the same sense of frustration. it's much harder when you know it's a person on the other end.
after doing some muscle assessment, our supervisor wanted us to stand him up and walk him. so that was what we did. stood him up from bed, and seeing that his balance was good, we decided to walk him a bit.
when we were just walking out of the room door, his daughter came walking around the corner. when she saw him walking, she started crying out, "Dad, Dad! You're walking!" and started crying at the same time. he walked up to her and she gave him this tight hug. then she turned around and called out, "Mom! Dad's walking!"
the man disengaged himself from his daughter and continued walking out of the doorway. just a short distance away from the room door was a pair of ladies, apparently just following behind the first daughter and got held up and was talking to his doctor. one was younger, obviously another daughter, and the other lady was his wife.
when he saw his wife, he let out this great wrenching sob, which really surprised me because i never expected him to be able to express anything, and stumbled to her. and this lady turned to him, and her face just crumpled up when she saw him walking towards her and she started crying. and they stood there hugging and crying.
it got emotional. he was crying, his wife was crying, his daughters were crying, his son showed up halfway, and they were all crying and hugging and were just so happy to see him walking. they kept repeating with this amazed, grateful joy, "You're walking! You're walking!" even my supervisor was tearing a bit. i must say though, it was pretty pretty emotional.
and because this was in the corridor, it kinda held up the flow of lunch-hour traffic, but nobody minded. not a single bit.
we walked him back to his bed and left him with his family. our supervisor was still tearing a bit, and one of the senior nurses teased her, saying she had been crying every single day she had been working with the patient. our supervisor said this was the rewarding thing about working in neuro and she still gets affected by it.
i can see why.
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10 comments:
i wished i'm in healthcare/rehab as well.
money ain't the only reward in life sometimes =)
makes me really wanna go into occupational therapy or art therapy
hello dilys,
well, working in the healthcare/rehab job is not that different from other jobs as well. it does get monotonous at times, cos u see the same patient usually for at least a few weeks before u decide to discharge them home or to further rehab, u have to deal with unpleasent smells and stains, you have to motivate your patient(even if u r feeling crappy and not that motivated yourself) etc etc.
but yes, it does have its rewards ^^. if making a difference in ppl's lives is your cup of tea.
btw, where do i know you from?
Im already crying by just reading what you wrote.. I remember my first neuro prac in 2nd year & I cried with the patient too.. its really sad :(
hmmm. yes. rehab and neuro, well, i guess u can call it a bucket of tears kinda experience. some things you see can make u really sad.
we 3g you at the new farm park picnic!!! yr sis's fren
i wanna work with traumatized children. also have a keen interest in suicide studies.
i suppose i'm very badly affected by people around me and being in a 'sad' environment ain't for me.
ah. i think i know who u r now, myserious dilys. it's pretty hard when ur nick is not related to your name, "j"...unless i am completely wrong?? ^^
i wouldn't say it's a sad environment but it'll be good if u can not let yourself be too affected by it, better if u can bring some positive-ness to it. :)
tramuatised children...hmmm...that's a really tough one. i only had one experience with that so far, but after going through it, makes me wanna go beat up the parents. hmmm. can get really diasppointed and angry. that's not an easy field to work in.
well, what i want to say is, feeling for others is not a bad thing. it's a good thing. but, it's really how you handle the emotional and mental impact that determines how long u can work in that area.
J??? hmmmm....don't think I have any connection to that!!!
My actual name is Dilys and it's in my birth cert =)
ah really. for some reaons, i thought ur name was jasmine. hmmm. must be dreaming again >_<
sorry for the mix up ^^
Jasmine was there with us at the picnic as well =)
oh my. lol. i must have too stoked from the video call to remember who was who. i only really remember ignatius's huge face overshadowing the screen! hahahaha
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