The Patient in Room Nine Says He's God by Louis Profeta

Author:Louis Profeta [Profeta, Louis]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9781780997360
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Harry Carter’s Shoes

He was, in all practical purposes, the first patient whom, for a prolonged period of time, I had ever cared for and with whom I had established any real bond, and the first to die under my supervision. He gave me a lesson in contrition and showed me that everyone has a soul, a spirit capable of reflecting God’s goodness, one with the potential to impact the lives of others, even if that exchange was just a brief, seven-word sentence. Harry left that mark on me and changed my life forever.

His life must have been very hard. He was beaten and bruised by time and through service to his country, and spent his final few months cooped up in a dark windowless room at the Pittsburgh VA Hospital. He was in my charge for nearly a month. I spent a good deal of time with him because he was sick as hell. Harry was about forty, had a form of bone cancer and hepatitis, and required an untold number of blood transfusions. His years of intravenous drug abuse had ravaged his veins, and he was covered with sores and scars of prior battles. His eyes were yellow with liver failure and contrasted sharply against his dark black skin. He was tall and sinewy, and well over six feet with a head of hair like Don King’s. His room had the constant sickening smell of sweat and bloody stool, which tended to keep the nurses from working too hard to provide care, which for that VA, unfortunately, seemed to be the norm rather than the exception. I recall discovering one of my patients there dead and stiff in rigor mortis, a condition that takes time to set.

Harry had low platelets (cells used for clotting blood) and consequently suffered from ongoing rectal bleeding, which for a man of his stature was humiliating, not to mention uncomfortable. He was constantly soiling himself and required a lot of nursing attention. As fast as I could put blood into Harry, it would break down or leak out from some orifice. His final weeks were certainly horrible, but this guy never complained. He always had a smile when I saw him and a new joke every day. He called me “Doc” and always made an effort to tell me what a good job I was doing. Each morning I was met with a “Hello” or a “Good morning, Doc,” and he made sure to send me on my way with a heartfelt “See you later” or “Have a good day.”

Unfortunately, all our therapies came to no avail. He failed chemotherapy; he was not a candidate for a bone marrow transplant, and all we could do was to keep replacing his blood and platelets. During one restless night, his movements pulled the only workable IV out, and I was forced to put a central line in Harry. This is a very large IV line that you place in one of the major veins leading back to the heart.

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