Coworkers EMC?

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nikolaite said:
Has anyone ever had a coworker develop a sudden emergency medical condition? If so, do tell about your experience. Any comments really. Thanks in advance.
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Our former illustrious mod ninja wrote about how their fellow doc had a cardiac arrest while on shift. You could search for that.
 
Once i had a coworker have a panic attack after his computer froze, went into SVT and subsequently tried to vagal himself out of it although ended up having a bowel movement which activated a subsequent code brown throughout the hospital. he was out for 3-4 weeks.
 
Had an attending show up sick to their shift, made it most of the night before getting sent home, coded in the waiting room on their way to the parking lot. Gets ROSC and goes to cath lab. First day of my ICU rotation, I walk in to find the night NP with his head in his hands, looks at me and says "Dr. X coded last night, they're coming up from the cath lab with an Impella in just a few" Made it out of the ICU, home, CABG after the COVID waiting period and back to work.

1st week of EM on my TY, showed up septic by definition from a facial cellulitis. Was on ABX from PCP. Senior resident ultrasounds my face and neck, Chief resident says "You cough one too many times, I'm intubating you", attending writes me an additional Rx. Worked for a week like that, and lost 11 pounds
 
medschool2cool said:
Once i had a coworker have a panic attack after his computer froze, went into SVT and subsequently tried to vagal himself out of it although ended up having a bowel movement which activated a subsequent code brown throughout the hospital. he was out for 3-4 weeks.
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I don’t care if this is made up or not. Best story of the thread.
 
I wasn't present for this one but two of my past colleagues were doing a cric on a failed airway and one of them was diaphoretic after the procedure and white as a ghost. He went to sit down and kept rubbing his chest and one of the nurses took him in a room and got an EKG. Meanwhile, the other doc, who was a retired cardiologist who somehow got into EM gets handed an acute STEMI and starts cursing like a sailor and goes "WTF?! Somebody had a STEMI while I was in that case? Where are they?!" and the nurse tells him that's the first docs EKG. He gets wheeled to the Cath lab and they put a stent in his circumflex I believe.
 
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At my last s#it job (UPMC are cheapskates and suck), it was single coverage, so, I wasn't there for this. But, one of the guys from the Mother Ship was working a shift, and dissected a vert. He felt it, suspected it, ordered his own CT angio, declined an ambulance, and drove himself the 2 hours to the Mother Ship!
 
I only know of two. Worked with both of them, but wasn't on shift.

First - new onset asymptomatic afib -> CVA. Apparently started acting off and lead to his workup. Eventually returned to work.

Second - doc took a tree limb to his head the day prior to his shift while doing some pruning work at home. Dissected a vertebral artery and stroked. Was singled coverage. Nursing noted he was off and called in another doc. Made a good recovery and returned to work after rehab.

Final doc (worked with the doc who worked him up). Pediatrician who was gradually acting more and more strange (months). Patient families started asking about him. His colleagues dragged him into an ER with gait changes. CT -> dilated ventricles -> MRI -> meningeal enhancement -> LP with coccidiomycosis meningitis leading to cerebral aqueduct obstruction. No immunodeficiency, but lived in AZ.
 
I once came into work when I was fresh out of residency to see a hard-core older doc (who worked 20 shifts/month to send money to his daughter that lived in NYC) pushing around a pole. What was it? A Cardizem infusion for his AF/RVR. Was still seeing patients, not on a cardiac monitor, didn't even register as a patient. Talked the pharmacist into giving him the Cardizem infusion.
 
Apollyon said:
At my last s#it job (UPMC are cheapskates and suck), it was single coverage, so, I wasn't there for this. But, one of the guys from the Mother Ship was working a shift, and dissected a vert. He felt it, suspected it, ordered his own CT angio, declined an ambulance, and drove himself the 2 hours to the Mother Ship!
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That is some tough stuff right there.

I watched my best friend have a CVA during a business meeting: started breathing hard, gripping the phone module super hard with his r hand (hand turned white), started telling the engineer he was talking to that he couldn't understand her (she was perfectly clear with what she was saying)... I immediately ended the meeting, told everyone this was a legit medical emergency and got EMTs on the way. He then lost the ability to speak, and when I tried to help relocate him for the EMT's arrival, his right leg gave way. We were at the ER in like 20 mins, but due to his development of receptive aphasia couldn't understand what people were saying and was agitated. Doc said to me it was classic MCA stroke, but wrote ETOH w/d in the records according to his wife, basically. Like 8 hrs later after passing unconscious he was transferred out of state where CTA resulted in LVO, but because ER NIHSS said "0", and NPs we’re coordinating care,no thrombectomy. Super weird stuff. Now he's all effed up. Wish it had been a rockstar save like you guys.

Anyway, it's what got me into stroke research last year.
 
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southerndoc said:
I once came into work when I was fresh out of residency to see a hard-core older doc (who worked 20 shifts/month to send money to his daughter that lived in NYC) pushing around a pole. What was it? A Cardizem infusion for his AF/RVR. Was still seeing patients, not on a cardiac monitor, didn't even register as a patient. Talked the pharmacist into giving him the Cardizem infusion.
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Why wouldn't he just take some PO dilt. Or convert himself w/ some flecanide? People are strange.
 
Mount Asclepius said:
Because we live for the stories. An IV pole is way more epic than PO. Doesn’t even matter if it makes sense. Why else would we work in the ED?
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He also reportedly starting having numbness/weakness of a hand while on shift at another hospital and ordered his own MRI. He continued seeing patients.

Funny guy. Feel for his health problems though.
 
southerndoc said:
I once came into work when I was fresh out of residency to see a hard-core older doc (who worked 20 shifts/month to send money to his daughter that lived in NYC) pushing around a pole. What was it? A Cardizem infusion for his AF/RVR. Was still seeing patients, not on a cardiac monitor, didn't even register as a patient. Talked the pharmacist into giving him the Cardizem infusion.
Click to expand...

I love it! What a great story!
 
CajunMedic said:
Had an attending show up sick to their shift, made it most of the night before getting sent home, coded in the waiting room on their way to the parking lot. Gets ROSC and goes to cath lab. First day of my ICU rotation, I walk in to find the night NP with his head in his hands, looks at me and says "Dr. X coded last night, they're coming up from the cath lab with an Impella in just a few" Made it out of the ICU, home, CABG after the COVID waiting period and back to work.

1st week of EM on my TY, showed up septic by definition from a facial cellulitis. Was on ABX from PCP. Senior resident ultrasounds my face and neck, Chief resident says "You cough one too many times, I'm intubating you", attending writes me an additional Rx. Worked for a week like that, and lost 11 pounds
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Dude wtf - pls explain 👀
 
CajunMedic said:
Had an attending show up sick to their shift, made it most of the night before getting sent home, coded in the waiting room on their way to the parking lot. Gets ROSC and goes to cath lab. First day of my ICU rotation, I walk in to find the night NP with his head in his hands, looks at me and says "Dr. X coded last night, they're coming up from the cath lab with an Impella in just a few" Made it out of the ICU, home, CABG after the COVID waiting period and back to work.

1st week of EM on my TY, showed up septic by definition from a facial cellulitis. Was on ABX from PCP. Senior resident ultrasounds my face and neck, Chief resident says "You cough one too many times, I'm intubating you", attending writes me an additional Rx. Worked for a week like that, and lost 11 pounds
Click to expand...

In before Birdstrike deftly and correctly points out that this is why EM is a bad decision; because it's the only field in medicine where you're expected to never be sick, and if you are sick, you need to keep working.
 
medschool2cool said:
Once i had a coworker have a panic attack after his computer froze, went into SVT and subsequently tried to vagal himself out of it although ended up having a bowel movement which activated a subsequent code brown throughout the hospital. he was out for 3-4 weeks.
Click to expand...
I just reread this for like the tenth time and each time it makes me laugh. I nominate for SDN post of 2021.
 
Not in the ED, but still a crazy story. I worked as a ski patroller before med school.

While resting in the block house on the top of 8000' mountain in the middle of winter, a 70 something year old long-time ski patroller gets some sudden onset CP, diaphoresis, and turns pale. Another patroller (and paramedic) recognizes it as a genuine "oh ****" moment and gives the patient some aspirin as he loads the pt into a toboggan and proceeds to ski him down and off the mountain to an ambulance he had called in. The ambulance is driven by two former ski patrollers from the same resort who know the patient very well and have worked with him for years. EMS EKG shows STEMI. They start driving down the hill to the nearest hospital about 20 minutes away. At about 5 min out the paramedic in back calls in the report, but the close hospital tries to defer and advises pt be taken to major academic hospital 40 minutes further away. In the middle of this conversation, the pt codes. Paramedic in the back begins CPR, the driver pulls over, they shock once, get a rhythm back, driver goes back up front and they start FLYING the last 3 minutes to the close hospital, and radio that they will be there in 1 minute with their now ROSC patient. Pt is stabilized in the cath lab and eventually recovers. I believe it was a complete LAD occlusion. The pt has since returned to patrolling at the same resort he nearly died at.
 
xaelia said:
Normalize self-care rather than glorify self-harm.
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<RANT>
For sure. I was at a place where a doc worked through his shift while developing an appy, drank contrast while on shift, got scanned (while seeing patients), diagnosed with an appy, finished his shift and then went to the OR.

The department head sent out an email touting how awesome, dedicated, and hardcore this guy was. The implication was that this was great behavior that we should be in awe of and emulate.

No one seemed to think, this guy was developing a serious infection that is generally viewed as painful enough to warrant IV narcotics. Clearly this raises concerns that he was working in an impaired state* and continued to treat patients.

Talk about normalizing stupid behavior.

Or, if you can't find someone to cover your shift while you are sick, you should work the shift. WTF? How about planning for the eventuality that people will become sick/unavailable/etc. without notice and designing your staffing so that it can handle this?

This is the Nth burnout reason.

*even if he wasn't, there would be lots of room for a medical board or medmal plaintiff attorney to raise this concern.

</RANT>
 
We don't specifically have "backup" to cover sick call here – but it is entirely acceptable to call out sick, to call out or miss part of your shift because your kid is sick, etc., and we encourage it in a positive way because we know we will all need it someday, ourselves.

It is not our individual responsibility to staff the ED; if flow grinds to a halt and wait times balloon out, that's on the hospital administration for failing to allocate redundant FTE and design our rosters appropriately. Luckily, we tend to have 7-10 docs of varying levels on the floor at any one time – it's not always enough to cover 350 patients a day, but it also means people don't just die unseen.
 
TeddyBoomBoom said:
Dude wtf - pls explain 👀
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Had an ingrown hair that turned into a nasty cellulitis. Was going back and forth from the 'Burg to home in Louisiana between shifts. Primary care said there was nothing to I & D and started ABX. Figured it would look bad taking off ED shifts the 1st week of intern year at the program I originally wanted to match at. Went to work for a solid week with fevers as high as 102, eating ibuprofen and tylenol for the fever and pain, tachycardic in the 110's-120's, felt like garbage with no appetite. Submandibular areas were swollen and entire jaw and anterior neck was erythematous. Had cobblestoning on an ultrasound of my neck. Even though it was superficial, still looked like I had Ludwig's angina. No one ever thought to say "you look like crap, take a day off..."
 
CajunMedic said:
Had an ingrown hair that turned into a nasty cellulitis. Was going back and forth from the 'Burg to home in Louisiana between shifts. Primary care said there was nothing to I & D and started ABX. Figured it would look bad taking off ED shifts the 1st week of intern year at the program I originally wanted to match at. Went to work for a solid week with fevers as high as 102, eating ibuprofen and tylenol for the fever and pain, tachycardic in the 110's-120's, felt like garbage with no appetite. Submandibular areas were swollen and entire jaw and anterior neck was erythematous. Had cobblestoning on an ultrasound of my neck. Even though it was superficial, still looked like I had Ludwig's angina. No one ever thought to say "you look like crap, take a day off..."
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I've seen this (bolded) happen a few times in my career. Totally righteous cellulitis of the chin region. Nice and puffy, fluctuant.
 
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