Mending Broken Hearts

1. First Impressions

Besides, it's not like I would ever find anyone on my own anyway. 

*******

Of course, my awful kismet meant that I would draw the shortest straw even when the intern schedules were being made. There was no other explanation as to why only I out of my entire intern class found myself on one the toughest rotation in residency: the ER rotation, on day 1.

Chicago, a city of almost 2.7 million people, had its fair share of accidents, violence related injuries as well as the never ending heart attacks, strokes etc. And since we were the biggest hospital in the area, our ER was always full.

It didn't help that because of the poor state of primary health care (similar to general practitioners in other countries) and the even poorer health insurance system in the country, the majority of people tended to use the ER as their primary care facility (instead of going to a general practitioner). So along with the real emergencies, we also saw many people who visited the ER only because they had run out of their diabetes or blood pressure medicine.

Our ER shifts in general lasted for 8 hours, which may seem like an improvement over the 36 hours surgery shifts that I had done as a medical student in Pakistan, but no one had mentioned how much heart stopping medical drama went on in this particular ER.

By the 7th hour of my 8 hour long shift, I knew I had done a decent job with patient care, but I was completely exhausted and hungry and I couldn't even remember the last time I had drank any liquid. But I was a new intern hellbent on doing a kickass job this year to get kickass letters of recommendation for my dream surgery program application next year. 

First impressions were key. So when a new patient rolled into the ER, and the head nurse called out, "50 year old male with intense abdominal pain that started 3 hours ago. Who can see him?" I summoned every last ounce of strength and jumped up to volunteer even before she finished her sentence.

"Me"

The nurse shook her head and smirked, muttering "interns" under her breath before she handed me some of the paperwork that paramedics had bought in with him. I pursed my lips, but ignored her rolling eyes and instead my gaze averted to the suturing kit she held in her hand.

The contents of the kit could be seen through the clear plastic cover, but I could have told anyone what it contained; a scalpel, a hemostat to clamp blood vessels, forceps, scissors, needle with the attached dissolvable thread also know as the suture. Just as I could have told anyone the name of the company that produced it: Surgilab - a proudly Pakistani company that supplied surgical instruments to many countries around the world. 

As much as that company was the bane of my existence, it was also the reason I dreamt of becoming a surgeon - or maybe that too was just my father's dream that I was trying to fulfil. 

I looked down at the paperwork in my hand. Either ways, I was stuck doing a non-surgical residency for one year. 

Might as well make the best of it, I told myself, not for the first time. 

*******

"Hello Mr. Jacob, I am Dr Khan. What brings you in today?"

"Don't know what happened doc, but I was at my job, and sitting at my desk as usual and all of a sudden I started to get this really bad pain in my stomach," the man said, placing his hand on the left lower side of his abdomen.

I couldn't help envisioning the man's anatomy under the spot that he was pointing towards, and remembering that the only anatomical structure in the left lower part of the abdomen was the large intestine.