Beautiful India...I left a part of my heart there. I do each and every time, to every place I travel to.
One last story from Silchar, Assam....
I was working in post-op one day, discharging the kiddos from the day before and getting ready for the first ones to come out of surgery. I heard loud screaming coming from the ward next to us. It was a large ward of men. The room was filled with men recovering from surgery, sick, healing or dying, a sea of beds and mats on the floor. I walked by the ward each time I went down the long hall and would peek in and wave to the patients sitting up or walking in the halls. I saw chest tubes draining into old, used saline bottle or water bottles, rusty IV poles, and children playing between and under the beds while visiting their families.
I continued to hear the screaming for hours. The screaming continued. 10/10 pain screaming. I sometimes tell my own patients as they are eating McDonalds and laughing that that 10 out of 10 is like being caught on fire and having your arm ripped off and then drug by a car at highways speed and that perhaps they could reconsider their 10/10 pain number they just gave me. This sound was that, 10/10.
At some point, I came to the conclusion that I could not listen to this man suffering any longer. I was torn. A part of me was worried that I shouldnt get involved, scared of what I would find. But, I realized that all of that didn't matter. I didnt care. I was a person and I knew that I could help and he was a man that needed help. I asked my favorite translator to join me. And we went. All eyes were on me as I walked in and asked, well...sort of demanded to know what was going on. I walked up to the man and placed my hand on his chest and for a moment,the screaming quieted. I asked the translator to talk to him and she walked up to the head of his bed and turned her face away, saying "I cant do this." I told her she could and she did. I looked up at his face and saw. He had been struck by lightning the night before. The left side of his face had been completely burned, his left eye burned and looked as if it had been ruptured. It was draining clear/yellowish fluid down his face, part of the fluid dripping, partially dried, leaving a white trail down his cheek. He had burns to his legs. All exposed, not cleaned or wrapped and weeping fluid.
Through translation, I discovered that the patients families are the ones that go to get the patients medications filled. This man had no one, he had been dropped off. I glanced at the chart and saw only mild pain meds ordered only twice a day. I asked the translator why the other families with their small children playing in the room and around the screaming man allowed this to continue. I asked why they didn't help. I was told that they all had their own patients to attend to. I felt anger. I told her to go get the nurse or the doctor and that I wanted to speak with them. I then told her to find someone to go get the medicine and that I would pay for it. The nurse arrived and I ended up not having to pay for the meds. Someone went to get them. The nurse medicated him and then cleaned and bandaged the burns. I had to return to post-op to take care of the kiddos coming off the OR table but I went back that day, and everyday the rest of the time I was there to check in on him. I would walk up to him, put my hand on his chest and comfort him for just a minute, say a silent prayer. I would stop by another man in the ward that had been burned and visit him and say hi to the man on the bed by the door with his chest tube draining in the plastic, used water bottle.
If not me or you, then who. One person, one tiny seed of hope. It does matter.
