A Family for the Children's Doctor by Dianne Drake

Author:Dianne Drake [Dianne Drake]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2012-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIX

THE clinic was locked up tight, but the monk who lived at the tiny wayside mission didn’t object when Adrian offered to break in. In fact, Brother Flavian took a kick or two at the thick wooden door himself in an attempt to get it open. It was Adrian’s kick that did it, though. Broke it right down to the hinges, and left it gaping.

Inside, without a word, as if they anticipated each other’s movements, Adrian went straight to the exam table in the small office, laid Elena down on it and took her vital signs while Caprice started rummaging through the meager supplies on the shelf in the room, looking for a lavage tube—the tube to be inserted through Elena’s nose into her stomach, commonly called an NG tube or nasogastric tube. She wasn’t sure what she’d find, and the tube she eventually came up with was an unexpected surprise. “I think this will do,” she said, even though it was infant-sized.

The activated charcoal Adrian produced, with the assistance of Brother Flavian, who’d done a brilliant job of breaking into the medicine supply without causing permanent damage to the cabinet lock, was a good bit of fortune, too. “What else?” the monk asked, as he looked over at Elena, who seemed in great distress.

Her breathing was decreasing. So was her blood pressure, Adrian guessed, without taking another reading right at that moment. Her agitation was spiraling down, too, almost to the point she was totally without movement. Not a good sign, though. It meant the poison was overtaking her and, in effect, shutting her down.

“Oxygen?” Adrian asked Brother Flavian. He was a portly, older man who’d long since given up the long brown robes for baggy khaki pants and a loose-fitting floral shirt. Much more practical in the jungle.

“Might have a tank of it here somewhere,” he said, scurrying out of the room to have a look.

As Caprice busied herself inserting an intravenous line, Adrian, in a swift, precise movement, inserted the NG tube into Elena, listened with the stethoscope to make sure it was in her stomach, then took the large-bore syringe Caprice had previously filled with the liquefied activated charcoal and forced it down the tube.

Elena’s slender body immediately stiffened, and reflexively started to fight the procedure by twisting and turning.

“I’ll go find something to calm her down,” Caprice said, on her way out the door once Adrian’s procedure was under way. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and there will be some Valium here.”

“See if there’s something to get her metabolic acidosis under control, too,” Adrian said, not quite so hopeful on that front. By now the acid levels in Elena’s body were on the rise because of the aspirin, risking a stomach or intestinal bleed, and they needed to normalize that situation as much as possible. But to have the proper drugs in a tiny clinic such as this? He wasn’t holding his breath on that one.

Caprice gave him a quick nod, her face showing the strain.

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