I got to our beach house yesterday afternoon, and had just put the bread maker on when I heard an urgent knocking on our door.
My first thought, as always, was that someone was coming to complain about the dogs. I opened the door and found an elderly, distressed and wild eyed man standing there. “Are you a nurse?” he said. He looked so disappointed when I said no that I relented and said I was a doctor – surely a close second in terms of functionality in most respects, I would have thought. “I just suddenly started feeling breathless and couldn’t get through to my doctor…” I ushered him into the house, and at that moment by some sort of divine miracle our friend who is staying at our place, and who is a physician, arrived.
It turns out the old guy is called Ron, and he is our neighbour from across the road. He’s lived there for 25 years but we’ve never met him before because we are terrible people. My friend did a history and exam while I made Ron a cup of tea. His heart rhythm seemed to be irregular, and a sudden onset of shortness of breath can be serious, so we decided to call an ambulance. I have never in my life phoned 111 before – I didn’t even know if I had to put the local area code (04) at the start (No you don’t as it turns out). Of course I was ringing from my cell phone because we don’t even have a landline anymore. I got a brief grilling and then some instructions, and then it was a matter of waiting. We popped back next door briefly, to get Ron’s medications and toothbrush. I didn’t want to intrude so I waited outside, nervous that if he suddenly collapsed I’d get in trouble, so I kept an ear out for sounds of an old man falling to the ground. However, he made it out safely and we went back to our house.
It took half an hour for the paramedics to arrive, and they came in a car, not an ambulance. We are an hour’s drive away from the hospital, and this was Friday afternoon, so it would take even longer. Hence they’d sent us a sort of local scouting force, a triage team to see how serious and urgent things were.
By now, Ron was feeling much better, and was relaxed and chatty. The paramedics were asking him all sorts of personal questions, as of course they must, and at one point asked him whether he minded me being present. I was quite taken aback. Asking about diarrhea and vomiting, bladder symptoms, and medication history is hardly salacious details for any doctor – or any mum for that matter. Luckily Ron felt the same way. They did an ECG and his heart was pretty much back to normal. However, after ringing Ron’s GP – who decided quite sensibly that 4:30 on a Friday was not a good time to assess whether someone had had a heart attack or not – it was decided to get Ron to hospital in an actual ambulance. Now the real waiting began. After I’d offered everyone another cup of tea, conversation got a bit awkward. We started chatting about the view and the weather, over the sounds of the bread machine doing a mixing cycle. In the meantime, the dogs were scratching at the door and howling from the bedroom I’d shut them into at the ambo’s request. So, I said I’d take the dogs for a walk while we waited. It was a lovely early evening, although there was a chilly wind. When I got back to the house, Ron and his two attendants had gone. Had the ambulance finally arrived? Apparently not, according to my physician friend. They’d decided to go back to Ron’s house to wait.
In the meantime, I’d missed my work staff meeting I’d intended to join by Zoom. I’ll make sure to let my boss know I had a super valid excuse.
We had dinner (curry, too spicy), and watched some TV whilst intermittently looking out the window to see how things were getting on. It wasn’t until dark that Ron finally got taken away. Of course, that would only be the start of waiting for the poor chap. I’m sure he had many more hours of sitting around in ED ahead of him. I hope they got him a place to sleep. This morning’s newspaper is sitting on his lawn so I’m guessing he’s still there.
I’m going to make a donation to St John’s ambulance today.