One patient that truly touched me was my first trauma patient on my ER rotation. I feel bad that I don't remember her name, I just remember her as Trauma-Alert, Bagel.
She was a paramedic, about my age, who had been hit by a car on a bike ride. Anyway, she was hysterical. Just glancing at the way her legs were, it looked like she had broken her pelvis or maybe a femoral head. She was wearing a helmet so her mental faculties were fine.
So after we helped get some Versed and Fentanyl on board, I noticed that no one was talking to her at all - just focusing on her lower body injuries. So I walked up and stood next to her head but leaned in so she could see me despite the C-collar and held her hand. And asked her name, and what had happened, and if she had any pain, etcl And then asked if she had any questions - and she just wanted me to explain what was going on. So I held her hand for like 10 minutes and told her what they were worrying about, told her that no, her face was fine and she just had a little scrape on her chin, we were going to do a CT scan of her pelvis and no, I couldn't go in there with her.
I had some other things to do while she was in radiology, but when I heard she was back in a cube I went and found her and made sure she was comfortable and didn't have any more questions. She had a pretty crabby nurse who wasn't pleased that the pharmacist and I had spoken with the patient - she was apparently asking for "the pretty nice girl in the white coat" as soon as she came out of radiology.
I was able to find her dad and fiance in the waiting room and bring them back, and she introduced me as "the nicest lady in the whole world". Now anyone who knows me, knows that the Versed and Fentanyl probably had a lot to do with her perception (my parents, ICU nurses, laughed hysterically when I told them this story) but it really brought it home to me that every patient is a person, and is usually scared, and if one person in the situation can take a minute to spend with them, it may change their entire experience with us.
At the end of my 4-week rotation she was not yet back to work but her fiance (also a medic) brought in a patient one night and made a point to come find me and tell me that she was still talking about how nice it was for me to keep her informed with what was going on and taking the time to find her room and check up on her later.
So while not some major drug interaction intervention, this was one of my first rotations and really helped me think of patients as people and not just a list of problems.
