Coma Response

There are faint memories of a struggle, drowning almost – breathe and come up for air. She’d call out for an answer, but no one would respond. Her voice was a faint gargle. Whether it was stream of consciousness or whether it was realized that she lay in a hospital bed of the Vanderbilt ICU, thoughts were present of the machines at her bedside, just beeping and clicking away. How many I.V. fluids and medications does it take to preserve one poisoned 22-year old? T.P.N.: That’s Total Parenteral Nutrition: A combination of glucose carbohydrates, amino acid proteins, and fatty acids. Let’s not forget the preventative antibiotics to ward off possible infections. In the weeks following November 10th, 2009 her life was an uncertainty: A supposed question mark. When her mother would ask, no, beg her husband, ‘Is our daughter going to be alright? Is she going to live?' A subtle nod and reassuring, ‘Of course,’ were incentives created for his family, but he wasn’t sure. His background in Medicine didn’t resolve any immediate questions. For the present was, after all that had happened, an unsettling situation where he did not dare predict the outcome as every day, inevitably and potentially presented newer challenges. One morning his daughter's atrial fibrillation was the center of his focus. A.F. is the most common form of arrhythmia. It is a problem with the rate or rhythm of the heartbeat.

Coma Response

A complication that arose out of the prolonged cocaine use was hyperthermia, a 107 degree temperature. As medications were ineffective in addressing a lower-than-usual blood pressure and the heart of the body would not respond to blood pressure elevating procedures, even more systemic questions were asked. It posed doctors and specialists with even tougher decisions about ‘what the next measure and step should be.’ An elevated fever coupled with an ischemic loss of blood within the tissue, which was the causation behind kidney failure. This was his daughter, for whom he prayed for each day. Septic shock and a dangerously low white blood cell count nearly rounded a disaster area in terms of her outcome. Her father denied himself the availability to turn fully spiritual.

Coma Response

He would never accept the allure to test fate. His devotion to the ideals of Hindu prayer stayed intact all while maintaining his faith in modern medicine that he had been practicing for three decades. And he relieved his sense of medical duty as a physician, by placing his daughter's care in the Chief of Surgical Trauma’s hands. After weeks of speculation, life would eventually begin to stagger north for the girl. Eventually she would blink and begin to open her eye lids. When she did, the confusion of drowning was forgiven, and she was no longer in search of an immediate response. Yet, she could not speak, and there was an apparent tube down her throat exiting from an incision towards the center of the front of her neck. She thought back to that calm sleep. Was she drowning?