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| This picture is taken of the patient three days after the surgery. Posted with permission from the patient. |
Kristen here….
Practicing medicine in Kenya where many of the modern day
technologies and conveniences aren’t available have led to many frustrating
moments, but it has also given the opportunity to really demonstrate the power
of prayer and to see the impossible become possible. There have been many of these such cases that
appear to be miraculous to me in our short time that we have been here and last
weekend was no exception.
I had the weekend off and decided to dedicate my Saturday
afternoon to the kitchen. My last batch
of banana bread muffins were in the oven, and the yeast I had mixed together to
make bread was bubbling in the bowl on the counter. I had just finished prepping all of the
things I needed to make broccoli cheddar soup for lunch when my phone
rings. I looked and saw it was the
doctor that was on call that was calling me.
Uh oh. You see, when you live at
the hospital there really is never a time when you are completely “off.” I answered and heard the hurried voice on the
other end. “Kristen, I have a patient
that has a retained placenta and is hemorrhaging. I have done everything I can and the bleeding
won’t stop. I think she needs a
hysterectomy.” My mind was racing as I hung up the phone and looked at the
unprepared food on the counter. This was
going to have to wait.
I changed into scrubs and ran to the hospital. I started reviewing the events that were
likely to unfold in the next several minutes.
This was not a good situation.
The patient had delivered at another clinic and the placenta never
delivered causing her to hemorrhage uncontrollably. I reached the OR and waited at the door. The other doctor and some nurses were running
her up the hill on a gurney. The doctor
that had called me was covered in blood.
“Her hemoglobin is 4,” he said was we pushed her through the door. I looked at her and called out. She moved her head and looked at me. At least she was still responsive…..
barely. If you or I had a hemoglobin of
4 we would no longer be conscious. We
were working on borrowed time and we all knew it. The other doctor and I moved
her weak body to the operating table.
Blood was spilling over the sides of the gurney as she was moved. “Do we have blood?”, I asked knowing that
she was going to need more than one transfusion to have a chance at recovering
from this. Her heart wouldn’t be able to
take much more blood loss. “No. Her blood type is B negative. A rare blood type for Kenya and the lab
doesn’t have anything that matches,” the
other doctor said from across the table. Not good.
We needed to move faster. I
started to get ready to scrub and called out for the nurses to start calling
all of the wards to see if there was a student or staff member that was willing
to donate that had her same blood type.
I prayed before the first incision was made and watched as
her pulse spiked and her blood pressure plummeted. We moved through the hysterectomy as quickly
as possible. These types of
hysterectomies, just after someone delivers, are the most complicated. The risk of significant blood loss is higher
than normal and none of the tissue looks or acts normally. I prayed for wisdom as we moved through the
surgery. I sighed some relief as the
major arteries were clamped and the patient still had a pulse. We hadn’t won the battle yet, but at least we
hadn’t lost. We finished the surgery
just as one student came forward to donate blood. She was the only one that could be found that
was a match. She could only donate one
unit. The patient would need at least 4
to have a fighting chance at surviving the traumatic insult she had just gone
through. I shook my head as I thought
about her newborn baby waiting with a relative.
Was this child ever going to know her mother? Did this mother even know what her baby
looked like? Had she already chosen a
name for the baby or carefully picked out receiving blankets to welcome this
newborn child home? I didn’t know the
answers to any of these questions.
I held her jaw forward in the ICU after surgery to help her
breath as the anesthesiologist looked for the appropriate tubing to hook up to
the wall to give her oxygen. Her pulse
was in the 160’s and her blood pressure was 70’s/40’s and falling every time we
took it. The one unit of blood that was
waiting for her wouldn’t be enough.
I left the hospital that afternoon praying for this
patient. A few of the staff came up to
me and told me that I had saved her life.
I simply shook my head. I didn’t
save anything and I knew it. Her chance
of survival was betting against all odds.
The only thing that would pull her through until morning would be the
Lord. As a physician, these are some of
the hardest cases because the control is completely out of my hands.
The next morning I walked into the ICU and found it to be
empty. My heart sank. She had died!
She must have died overnight and no one bothered to wake me up to tell
me. My eyes welled with tears. It was over.
I walked through the empty halls on that Sunday morning until I found
one of the OR staff. “What happened to
the patient in the ICU?” I asked, “Did she die?” The man standing in the hallway with me
smiled and with a chuckle he said, “No, she did not die. She did so well overnight it was decided that
she didn’t need to be in the ICU anymore and we transferred her to one of the
regular wards.” I am sure the look on my
face must have been priceless, because he couldn’t hold back his laughter any
more. I huge wave of relief washed over
me and I could feel the color coming back into my face as I rushed to the ward
to check on the patient.
As I walked into the ward I could not believe my eyes and I
knew immediately that everything was going to be fine. There was the patient, sitting up in bed and
holding her baby! She had survived the
night and was doing better than humanly possible considering what she had just
gone through. My jaw dropped. She made a full recovery and I discharged her
from the hospital three days later.
There is no reason for her to have done so well after something so
traumatic. It was a miracle.
