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“We’re going to move you onto a bed now, Mr. Lestor. This is going to hurt.” Brookes looks at the team around us as we get into position to lift Mr. Lestor. With a nod, we move as one, carefully picking him up and putting him on the bed.
The moment he’s on the bed, the nurses jump into action, drawing vials of blood and connecting him to an IV. One of the nurses gives him a sedative, trying to numb the pain as much as possible.
Mr. Lestor grits his teeth against the pain as Brookes begins to work, cutting away one side of his pants to get a better look at his leg. I take the other pair of scissors from another nurse and follow Brookes’ lead, carefully cutting away the material. Blood coats my gloves. Part of his femur has broken through his skin.
“Alright, now that we can see what we’re working with, I need someone to call ortho. Dr. Mulligan should be on tonight.” Brookes looks at the bones protruding and the part of Mr. Lestor’s leg that is flat.
One of the nurses grabs the phone on the counter at the back of the room, speaking in a low tone to the orthopedic surgeon as we cut away the rest of Mr. Lestor’s clothing to make sure we don’t miss anything.
“Mr. Lestor, we’re going to be taking you to surgery and doing everything we can to save your legs. We have to begin decompression as soon as we’re in there.” Brookes looks at me, worry clear in his eyes.
He doesn’t think Mr. Lestor is going to make it.
I can see it in his eyes, and it steals the air from my lungs. I force the feeling of helplessness down as far as I can. It won’t do my patient any good to think that the doctors can’t save him.
“Right now, we don’t know if there are any other injuries beneath the skin.” Brookes gives the man a reassuring smile as he looks down at him. “We’re going to run a couple scans right before we send you into surgery. There may be some disruption of your arteries, which is a cause for concern, but we’re going to do everything we can to take care of you.”
We get the bed ready to move. Mr. Lestor reaches out and grabs my wrist, his blood spreading across the yellow gown. I smile down at him and turn my hand over.
“My wife,” he says, his voice raspy. “She’ll be here soon.”
“I’ll make sure that she’s taken care of and knows exactly where to wait for you.”
Mr. Lestor nods, his eyes shutting and his breathing labored. Brookes flips the guardrails on his side of the bed up while I do the same on my side. We take off at a run through the emergency department to the operating rooms.
Please let us save his life.
After what feels like the longest surgery of my life, I stand in a fresh pair of lilac scrubs, watching as Mrs. Lestor sits beside her husband. She looks down at him like he is her entire world as she holds his hand.
Tears gather as I look at the two of them. I know that we aren’t out of the woods yet. Though we’ve done everything we can to ensure his quality of life, we weren’t able to save one of his legs. The other may still have to be amputated if healing doesn’t progress properly.
A hand lands on my shoulder as I take a step away from the open door to give them their privacy. As I turn around, Brookes gives me a sympathetic look.
“Crush injuries are the worst,” he says, his voice soft as we walk down the hall and away from the room. “There’s still the chance that necrosis could develop and the tissue we left could become unviable. We’re doing all we can to save him though.”
“It’s not easy to know that you did all you could, and something might still go wrong.” I take a deep breath, shoving the tears down. I can cry when I’m home. Right now, I need to be a doctor.
“There’s nothing more we can do. We have to watch for acute renal failure still, due to the toxins the crushed cells released in the body.” Brookes runs his hand through his hair, looking as devastated as I feel. “There’s a fifty percent chance that he will develop it.”
My heart jumps into my throat. “He’s alive.”
“And that’s what matters. That’s all we have to focus on right now. If he gets acute renal failure, then we do dialysis. We have a plan in place, Jessie. Everything is going to be fine. We’ll know more once his next round of tests comes back, but there’s nothing more we can do right now.”
I sigh and nod, the helpless feeling still sitting right below the surface. “I need to go fill out my reports.”
“I’ll come with you.”
The tightness around my chest eases slightly knowing that I won’t have to fill out the reports alone. There’s no way I would be able to write down every detail of what happened today without sobbing.
I can’t break down yet. Not at work. Not in front of Brookes.
We head to the nurses’ station and grab two tablets before finding one of the overnight rooms. Brookes holds the door open, waiting for me to enter before joining me.
I take a seat in one of the wooden chairs at the tiny table in the room. There’s a single bed in here, pushed into one corner, and another small desk for working.
Brookes pulls his chair closer to me and sighs, tilting his head back and running a hand down his face. He closes his eyes, his dark eyelashes fanning across his cheeks.
Even if today was hard, there’s something about seeing Brookes so in his element that is attractive. He was born to be a doctor. Brookes cares about his patients, and I’m sure tonight is going to weigh as heavily on him as it does on me.
