there's a human being under there

We do complicated things in the ER sometimes. One of the things we do is called "therapeutic hypothermia", in which we lower the body temperature after a cardiac arrest to preserve brain function.

The patient is intubated, on a vent. We use paralytics, sedatives to keep them out of it during the process. Usually this involves about 3 infusions just for this part. Most of them have had an MI so there are another couple of infusions. So usually you have 5-6 drips going. They need a foley, an OG.

Then there is the hypothermia process itself, that involves wrapping the patient in pads and hooking the pads up to a machine that circulates water throught the pads to cool the body down. A tube is placed in the esophagus and hooked up to the machine to measure body temp.

Lots of stuff to do, in other words. So, the idea is to get them up to ICU as soon as possible. You have a limited amont of time to accomplish all of it. So you are concentrating on getting it all done.

The point of all this? When you have a patient as complex as this, its easy to forget that there is a patient underneath all of those tubes. A human being. Then the family comes and you are reminded that this is someones loved one.