Indexing Title: OLEYSON's Medical Anecdotal Report [04-2]

MAR Title: When you lose someone close to you

Date of Medical Observation: 2004

Narration:

It was around 4:00 am when I received a text message from my sister asking me if I was on duty, I told her I was at home. She was suffering from a severe attack of asthma, I, then texted her to go to the hospital right away and instructed her to seek consult at OMMC. All the while I thought she already went to OM.  At around 9 o’clock in the morning, I was surprised when I saw my mother at the OPD and told me if I could attend to my sister who was still at home.  I immediately went to her house and was shocked to see her in severe dyspnea, and unable to stand. Suddenly she became cyanotic and apneic.  I tried talking to her while I  injected an ampoule of hydrocortisone which I brought with me, when she suddenly lost consciousness. She had no pulse and no spontaneous respiration. With my mind going blank, I automatically tried to do mouth to mouth resuscitation and chest compression. I was finally able to lift her to the car while my father drove us to the nearest hospital from our place while attempting resuscitation. At the hospital cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) was continued for 45 minutes to no avail. She was pronounced dead on arrival due to status asthmaticus. I later learned that she took approximately 30 nebules and her attack had been 12 hours long before I was able to get to her.

Insights (Discovery, Stimulus, REINFORCEMENT):

When someone close to you is your patient, it is very easy to lose your sense of composure and objectivity, as you realize your own limitation as a doctor and as a human being. As a doctor we can only do as much in a given situation, we are not God who has foresight on what is to come, we can only learn from our own personal experience and hope that we can do differently next time. In retrospect had I brought epinephrine with me, I could have reversed her condition, or may be not.