Medical Question

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  • Medical Question

    Hi everybody,

    Here's the scenario:

    A fifteen year old boy rides his bicycle and has an accident. How he has this accident isn't important. He could fall on a slippery road, be hit by a car, swerve to avoid something, any kind of accident. It doesn't matter, except that he is hurt, and hurt bad.

    An RN arrives on the scene. The boy can't talk. It doesn't have to be because of his injury, but he can't communicate with the RN. If he could, he could tell the RN what was wrong and she could take the steps necessary to keep him alive until an ambulance and paramedics arrive. But, since he can't
    tell her what is wrong with him, he will die.

    What kind of injury did the boy suffer? It has to be something internal that the RN can't see, but something that she could care for and keep him alive if she knew what it was.

    That's what I need. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

    Bob

  • #2
    Message deleted. In re-reading your post, I see that your requirement that "she be capable of keeping him alive if she just knew what it was" probably was not met with my suggestion. Sorry. [This may be a tough one (which is no doubt why you asked it - duh!), and could depend greatly on whether she has any equipment at her disposal on location.]

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    • #3
      Thanks Salazkin,

      Yeah, it's a tough one. And no, she doesn't have any equipment available to help her. But there is an answer. There has to be. I'm hoping someone can come up with it.

      Bob

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      • #4
        Bobn,

        I think you have created an impossible situation for yourself. How is he going to know what the problem is if the nurse cannot see it? And how can she, in any case, fix the problem without equipment?

        Good luck!

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        • #5
          Comic - though it may well be an impossible situation (I couldn't say - I think we need a doctor here), I don't think Bob means for the victim to know what his injury is. Bob just wants to know if it's possible that there could be such an injury that would be treatable if the nurse only knew what that injury was. E.g. he has an appendix that's about to burst and if she'd only applied pressure at the right spot on his abdomen (or some such thing), she'd have saved him.

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          • #6
            This might work: What if he is an asthmatic, who doesn't always need his medicine, so takes it occasionally. But, when he has his accident, he hypervenilates, and gets asthma ... and the nurse doesn't have any asthma medication with her, and he dies.

            Think of various scenes in "Signs" with the asthmatic son of Mel. Maybe he has his accident surrounded by corn fields, that he's allergic to. Riding through them would be fine, but being stuck in the middle of them because he's had the accident, keeps him around the pollen long enough to trigger an attack. Say he forgot to bring his inhallant. Just a thought.

            With asthma, the nurse would know what was killing him, but he wouldn't be able to talk very well, he would be too busy trying to breathe.
            -Sandy

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            • #7
              I work the other end of the business so I canâ€TMt speak with authority here. I think the main reasons accident victims die in the field are bleeding out, airway occlusion, cardiac arrest, shock, and internal carnal pressure. Accident victims are often â€found down†(they are unconscious). Nurses deal with unconscious patients regularly. Asking a victim where it hurt and how it happen can be beneficial but it not a big deal. You monitor the patientâ€TMs life signs and treat accordingly. What you propose is a contrived event. Once possibility is that he is allergic to something the EMTs are going to give him. Then he could go into Anaphylactic Shock and die. TSW

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              • #8
                > internal carnal pressure

                I think that's something else

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                • #9
                  Internal cranial pressure. Needless to say I get my stuff line edited. The editor works cheap to because I assume him to no end.

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                  • #10
                    I think we need him here - STAT.

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                    • #11
                      Here's your problem. With a serious closed head injury, there is nothing the nurse could do to prevent the boy's death even if she knew the extent of his injuries - unless she could have gotten him to a neurosurgeon very quickly. Also, even without being able to speak to the boy, she should be able to diagnose a closed head injury if she has any trauma experience at all.

                      Here's a possibility. Maybe he's allergic to bees and is stung while riding his bike. She is carrying a epipen, because she's allergic to something, but doesn't recognize the symptoms, because she's never actually seen someone else go into shock. The treatment is at her fingertips, but because the boy can't communicate with her, she can't (or doesn't) help him. That way he dies from something usually benign that could have been easily prevented had he been able to speak. This should increase the visceral impact for the audience and traumatize the nurse to no end.

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                      • #12
                        How about "internal bleeding"... it works for me!

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                        • #13
                          DUC. How's she going to stop it even if she knows?

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                          • #14
                            She'll stop it with an internal bandaid!

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                            • #15
                              Thanks everyone for your responses, and the humor. (Humor is a good thing.)

                              This is a teen/fantasy movie, so I'm not going to kill the kid. The nurse will comunicate with him. He will tell her what she needs to know, and she will save his life. She has to, because if the boy dies, her daughter dies too.
                              (You'll have to pay to see the movie.)

                              I would really rather have the boy and the nurse without any medical problems before the accident. (But, I'm flexible.)

                              I'm going to continue doing more research on this, but any other help would really be appreciated.

                              Someting is wrong with the boy that the nurse could easily rectify if she knew what it was. How hard can that be?

                              Thanks again,

                              Bob

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