3” wire vs man

I was sipping on a great cup of coffee when they came in to the ER. He was clearly in pain, slightly bent over from the waist and she had her hand on his back and a worried look on her face. He was in his sixties with dark hair that was heavily sprinkled with gray and even though he was hurting, he glanced up and managed a smile. She was carrying some extra weight and carrying a huge purse that had magazines peeping out from the top. I guessed her concern for him was so great that she was unable to manage a smile.

She said that she thought maybe he had food poisoning or something. She had never seen her husband suffer this way. “He is as tough as nails and it is scary to see him in such a mess.” Then she added, “Can one of y’all keep an eye out for our son, he is on the way down here?” I assured her we would.

This patient was hurting so bad that he found it near impossible to lay still, he was moving about as though he wanted to find a position that was less miserable but the position was no where to be found.

Shortly after the ER doctor saw him, he was whisked off to get an xray.

Then I turned my attention to a little girl was being taken to our ear, nose and throat room. She had pushed a sizable piece of chalk up her nose. I don’t know what is about kids but for some reason, they find a hole on their head and they shove something in it. We frequently had patients with things in their noses and ears. Usually these patients are 5 years old or younger. This young lady was 3 and she had a piece of pink chalk lodged deeply in her nose. It had caused her some discomfort and scared her mother so here she came, big smile, huge blue eyes, pigtails with pink ribbon and holding her American Girl doll tightly.

Our patient with the pain in his lower stomach was back from xray and he still looked so very sick. It was laborious just to look at him. The xray was a big surprise. This man had a wire about 3 inches long in his intestines. We later learned after his surgery that it had poked a hole in his intestines and had caused the contents to spill out into his abdomen.

It was now inflamed and he had peritonitis, which is very serious and life threatening.

The surgeon who  worked on this patient told us it was one of the worst he had seen. He said “That man is one tough cookie.” 

A couple of days after his surgery after discussing the wire with his physician and looking at it, he realized it was one of the bristles from the wire brush he uses to clean his grill. It must have been on the grill when he threw his burgers on there a few days earlier and it cooked into his burger. He eats fast and remembered feeling a scratch when he swallowed a big bite of burger but didn’t give it a second thought.

Every time I have seen a wire brush near a grill since then I think of this precious man and what he went through. I am so proud that he survived but it was touch-n-go for a while. 

None of us know how this glorious ride will end. We do careless things as we live our lives the best we know how. Who would think a 3 inch wire could be life threatening?
This was a good man with a nice family and I am thrilled it had a happy ending.