Chapter 1
Thursday 7:05 a.m. Jack was standing at the nurses’ station rubbing his eyes, as if that would clear the cobwebs from his brain. He was not used to getting up this early. His “early” classes the past two semesters at Appalachian State had started at 10 a.m., and the alarm clock this morning had been an unpleasant intrusion.
This was the first morning he was going to spend in the emergency department with me this summer. He wanted to see how his father spent his time as an ER doc, and he wanted to get an idea if a career in medicine was something he wanted to pursue. He would be a senior next fall, and he was twenty-two years old. Hard to believe.
“Wake up buddy! Amy Connors chided him. “Things are gonna get hopping’ here in just a little while. EMS is already out on a couple of runs.”
Amy was our unit secretary this morning. And she was the best I had ever worked with. She was in her late twenties and had been in the department for the past six years. Nothing seemed to bother her— no amount of stress of being yelled at by impatient physicians (of course, that wouldn’t be any ER doc), or even an overwhelming workload. She just rolled with whatever came her way. What I really appreciated was her anticipation of what needed to be done, regardless of the situation. She always seemed to be one step ahead of me, which is what every emergency physician needs.
I was drinking my first cup of coffee, and I looked over at Jack as Amy needled him. He smiled at her and said, “I’m awake, Amy. Don’t worry about me.”
We had gotten to the ER a little before seven, relieving Tom Anders, the overnight doc. He had left me a clean board, and the department was empty.
Jack sat down beside me, behind the nurses’ station.
“Dad… or Dr. Lesslie,” he hesitated. “Which should I call you? I hadn’t thought about that.”
“Why don’t you call him what we do?” Amy impishly suggested. “In fact, you could take your pick from a couple of names.”
Without looking in her direction I said, “Amy, don’t you have something to do?”
And then I said to Jack, “You know, we need to think about that. It might be best to call me Dr. Lesslie. That way, none of the patients would be confused or bothered.”
Before Jack could respond, our attention was drawn to a commotion coming from the triage area. The voices of several men could be heard, and they sounded pretty excited and angry. Over this din, I could hear the voice of Jeff Ryan, our triage nurse. He was trying without success to calm down the boisterous group.
“Hold on just a minute!” I heard him shout.
“We ain’t holdin’on!” someone responded angrily. “Johnny needs some help and he needs it right now!”
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