Friday, July 3, 2015

Is it really worth?


It was only today that a senior colleague and mentor wrote about love, care and concern showed by relatives of patients who've quite serious illnesses, especially when they come from not-so-well off backgrounds, both in terms of intellect and finances. 

In fact, we have a snake bite victim suspended between life and death . . . 

We were quite surprised that the parents brought this 8 year old boy who was bitten by a snake almost a day back . . .  20 hours to be exact. 

Shivam was playing in front of his home when he was bitten at around 6 pm last Monday. Neither his parents nor his friends saw the snake. It was with quite difficulty that they realized that Shivam was bitten by a snake . . . 

Shivam is intellectually disabled. He does not talk much and is known to be 'weak brained' by everyone in the village. He hardly speaks. And that was the exact reason nobody found out about the snake bite. 

It was only when Shivam started to develop breathlessness that his parents realized that something was amiss. Somehow, Shivam conveyed to them that he was bitten by a snake. In addition to the breathlessness, he started to have discomfort of the throat, which he conveyed well to his parents. 

Now, by the time, his parents realized that their son was bitten by a snake it was late morning the next day. As was the custom, they went to the wich-doctor, popularly called jaad-phuk. It was obvious that he could do nothing. 

By the time, Shivam reached KCH, he was desaturating and it was obvious that he needed assisted breathing. Being a child, we had our challenges. Our ventilator had conked off after being hooked to Dinkar. All the patients who came after Dinkar were manually ventilated. 

It's past 48 hours since he is intubated and being mechanically ventilated. And through this 48 hours, he had quite a many challenges, which I shall narrate in a later post. 

Today, sometime late evening, we realised that Shivam's sustained some amount of mechanical ventilation injury. There was subcutaneous emphysema - air under the skin. He's already had 3 changes of his endotracheal tube. 

His saturation is maintained well. We hope that he'll make it inspite of the subcutaneous emphysema. I've previously had couple of patients who went into this condition. One did not make it . . . the second one did . . . 

We request prayers for Shivam. 

I'm so encouraged to see Shivam's parents constantly at his side encouraging and chiding him to hold on. Do realize the entire family has been pitching in by manually bagging him. Manual bagging for 48 hours is no small thing . . . 

I wonder if a more well off family would have shown such care. I've at least seen in one instance when a well off family decided not to care when a major illness affected their mentally challenged son. 

Once more . . . request prayers for Shivam . . . 

If you ask me . . . it is really worth caring and making our utmost effort to save Shivam . . . for we are all made in God's Image . .  .


3 comments:

  1. Prayer for shivam - may Lord Jesus heal him

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  2. I am truly sorry to hear about Shivam. May God bless his soul. Atleast he had a caring doctor and loving family members who tried their level best. My heart cries out for his loved ones.

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