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Children: Paramedic Stories, Part Four (By Kendall V. Smith, Paramedic/EMT) (~Part One~) by Karen Lynn Vidra, The Texas Tornado
Tuesday, December 30, 2003
A paramedic writes about some of the most heartwrenching cases involving children that he has had to deal with during his tenure as a paramedic/EMT.
Being a paramedic, I oftentimes have to deal with some of the most heartwrenching situations involving children; and it makes my job quite challenging, to say the very least. It is especially gutwrenching when, despite everything you have tried to do, the child still dies on you, and there is nothing you can do to prevent it or stop it from happening.
Children are innocent and so full of life anyway, and when they become sick or injured, you have to put all your emotions aside and try to help the child and try to put on a brave affront and deal with the situation at hand. Such as the times I am about to share with you now.
One of the hardest cases I had to deal with was when a little girl, then eight years old, stopped breathing after suffering an acute asthmatic episode on Christmas Day. (The little girl was allergic to nuts, and she had suffered an acute asthmatic attack/allergic episode after eating the cookies. The cookies, it turned out, had nuts in it as part of the ingredients, and this was why she got sick so suddenly.) She didn't die, thankfully, but she was a very sick little girl, and we were very worried about her, especially since it WAS Christmas Day when this particular event took place. Unfortunately, sickness or tragedy doesn't spare the holidays; and this situation was no different. I remember the frantic call to 9-1-1; a mother was yelling over the phone that her young daughter was in trouble, and that they needed an ambulance to their residence. The mother was understandably upset, and she was saying that her young daughter, who was eight years old, was having a severe asthmatic episode and was having much difficulty in breathing, and that her breathing seemed to be getting worse as the minutes ticked by.
Upon arrival to the residence, we were surprised to find out that the child in question was one we happened to know: we had treated her before on several other occasions with her breathing. The little girl's name was Ronee' Le-Anne, and the child's mother who had called us for help was a nurse at a local hospital not far from where they lived. Upon arrival into the kitchen, where the child was, we were dismayed to find out that the child's face was a dark, dusky blue color, which told us that her brain wasn't getting enough in the way of oxygen, and her chest didn't seem to be moving all that much. That scared the hell out of us, but especially when the child slumped out of her chair and then fell onto the kitchen floor.
Almost immediately, we went to work, to try to help the child. We started giving her oxygen by way of nasal cannula, and we started an I.V. in her arm, and we listened to her heart and lungs; but all we could hear was the rushing of fluid in her lungs, which was NOT a very good sign. We also tried to get an airway down her throat; but her throat was swollen; and after we gave her a shot in the neck, the tube then went in easier; but the child was still in trouble. We were soon assisting her with her breathing, and we were sure that we were going to lose her; but we kept on working on the unconscious child, and we tried desperately to bring her back. We tried to arouse her by shaking her or by pinching her shoulders or her arm; but she just lay there, unmoving and her eyes still closed. She was unconscious. Her irregular, gasping breathing alarmed us, but what really alarmed us was the fact that she had a very high blood pressure reading: it was something like 150/100, which was exceedingly high for a child her age. (An eight-year-old's blood pressure should run about 90/60.) We knew that we had to get the little girl to a nearby hospital..and FAST.
It turned out that the little girl was sicker than we had first realized: not long after she had been stabilized in the P.I.C.U., she suddenly started seizing, and she went into a coma; and after tests had been run, it was discovered that the little girl had suffered a cerebral hemhorrage, or a stroke. She was completely paralyzed on one side, and only time would tell as to whether she would fully recover or emerge from the coma without any sort of physical or brain damage.
Another time, at this same residence, a little boy, then aged seven (he was the little girl's brother, and although they were about the same age, they were NOT twins; they were both adopted), had a sudden seizure. Seizures normally last anywhere from just under a minute to as long as five, tops; but this seizure was not the usual type of seizure. He kept having one seizure after another, without any break in between, and by the time we were summoned to the Sandusky residence, we found the little boy thrashing and writhing uncontrollably on his bedroom floor; and his small face was nearly black from lack of oxygen, and his eyes were rolled back into their sockets, showing only the whites; and he was drooling bloody sputum. We quickly rolled the little boy onto his side, so he wouldn't choke on his spit; and we tried to get an I.V. ling going; but that was impossible, as the little boy was seizing uncontrollably. We put an oxygen mask over his face, and we stayed by his side as he continued to seize; and we monitored his heart and breathing as best we could, considering the circumstances. But we knew that we had to do something fast, so we placed the still-seizing little boy on the gurney, strapped him loosely into place so he wouldn't roll off the gurney during the course of his seizure; and we quickly rolled him to the back of the ambulance, where we then put him into the back, locked the doors, and then sped off towards the closest hospital.
Johnny, the little boy, described above, had, it turned out, an episode of statis elepticus, or seizures that are severe and usually don't respond to medication; and it can be life-threatening if it is not treated promptly. At the hospital, upon arrival, he was still seizing; but then the doctors gave him some powerful anti-seizure medications; and soon, after nearly a half-hour of constant seizing, the seizures, mercifully, came to an abrupt end, and soon, the little boy was asleep. His breathing was irregular; but once we gave him oxygen and checked his vital signs later, he seemed to be coming around at long last; and about an hour later after coming into the hospital, he was awake, but groggy; and he was asking for some ice cream.
As bad as Johnny's and Ronee' 's situations were, they weren't the worst, for both survived, and they are still very much alive today. (I still see them on occasion if we are summoned to their residence for one of the other kids; and they are both doing very well. They just celebrated their 11th birthdays, and they are both growing like weeds and are growing more beautiful or handsome by the day.) Sure, they may have their health problems that may sometime require the services of paramedics, but for the most part, they are doing splendidly for all of the health problems they have had to endure in their young lives.
But probably the worst event involving children was the house fire last year on the east side of town. It was a beautiful, early spring April day, and all seemed fine; but then the tones went off, signifying a true emergency, which was, as it turned out, a house fire. There were possibly as many as five or six children trapped on various levels of the burning structure, and three of the children were handicapped.
Upon arrival, we were shocked to see the entire structure ablaze: flames were shooting up high in the warm sunny air, and there were already several ambulances and firetrucks on the scene by the time our rescue vehicle came. The mother was outside, crying for someone to rescue her babies; and donning antifire garb, I and my partner, Pat, went into the smoke-filled house and soon located the children. All but one of the children were unconscious. We quickly got the children out, one by one; and soon, we were working on the children. There were six children, three of them triplets, ranging in age from infancy to the age of six, and all but the oldest were unconscious. All were burned, and all were in pretty sad shape by the time we had gotten to them. The oldest child was crying out in pain and fright, and he became scared when he saw his little brothers and sisters lying on the ground, being tended to by firefighters or paramedics.
Suddenly, the little boy's eyes closed, and his little head fell back over my arm. He had stopped breathing. I quickly began mouth to mouth on the little fellow; but to no avail: despite my best efforts, he had died. He died from either his burns, shock, or from smoke inhalation.
The other children didn't fare any better: they died, too; they were all severely burned, and they also had smoke inhalation; this was probably what had killed them in the first place.
That particular episode nearly caused me to turn in my paramedic license, and for months afterward, I suffered from horrific and vivid nightmares. I couldn't get the children's faces out of my mind, and in my mind, all I kept hearing was the sound of the flames crackling and snapping as the house went up in smoke; and for months afterward, all I could smell was the fire and the nauseatingly sickening smell of burning flesh. It was a very bad time for me, and for months after the fire, all I kept thinking about was quitting the emergency medical services field altogether.
heartbreaking, what paramedics, firefighters, and police have to deal with...they deal with so much stress...i couldn't do it. my hats off to them, and a salute, and my grateful thanks for serving their fellow man. :)
(((HUGS))) and love,
karla. :)
Reviewed by Connie Washburn
12/30/2003
Very touching subject - My friend and neighbor has been a paramedic for about 15 years and I know there are some heart-wrenching stories out there to be told. Well done, Karla!
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Being a paramedic, I oftentimes have to deal with some of the most heartwrenching situations involving children; and it makes my job quite challenging, to say the very least. It is especially gutwrenching when, despite everything you have tried to do, the child still dies on you, and there is nothing you can do to prevent it or stop it from happening.
