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The Patient Who Taught Me to Care Twice
It was an ordinary day on duty in our dialysis centre. One of my regular patients had arrived for his usual hemodialysis session. I was quite close to him — I often joked with my patients, tried to make them smile. Dialysis can feel endless, and a little laughter lightens the hours. He usually came in with high blood pressure, so I always checked his BP before starting. But that day, the machine was not working. I told myself I would keep an eye on him instead, checking in frequently to see if he looked uncomfortable or showed any signs of hypertension. The session went smoothly at first. Everything seemed…
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A Very Humbling Night
I was in the final stages of preparing for my MRCEM exam in Emergency Medicine, while also working as a Medical Officer in the Accident and Emergency Department of a tertiary-care hospital.Our hospital stood a little outside the city, so the late-night hours were usually quiet. Cardiac patients were rare; if one did arrive, we gave first aid and referred them to a nearby cardiac centre.One morning, around 5:30 a.m., a 35-year-old woman was rushed in, a known hypertensive with heart disease, gasping for breath. On assessment, she was pulseless, with no cardiac activity. I started CPR immediately and asked one of the staff, more experienced with intubation, to pass…