24 Hours in A&E

Fifty two year old Mark is rushed to St George’s by air ambulance after a road traffic collision that threw him from his motorbike and left him suffering a cardiac arrest. Emergency doctors fight to keep him alive and when he arrives in A&E, Consultant Paul escalates his condition to ‘Code Red’ giving him an emergency blood transfusion. His wife Jacquie was at their home in Kent when police arrived to inform her of the accident and rush her to hospital: ‘We just felt they were getting us up there as quickly as possible really just to say goodbye to Mark.’ Jacquie talks about how her relationship with Mark slowly blossomed from a friendship into a romance. When Mark proposed at the top of a ski slope, Jacquie skied off, making him wait until the bottom to give him her answer “but there was never any doubt what the answer would be.” Now, married with two teenage sons, will the love of his family be enough to inspire Mark through his battle for survival? Twenty five year old Kayley is brought to St George’s after being thrown from her horse. On arrival, she has one leg longer than the other and doctors are worries she has a severe hip dislocation and other internal injuries. Her mother, Gail was at the scene of the accident, and describes the pain of seeing her daughter injured doing the thing she loves: ‘I’ve always been aware of the risks of the sport, riding has been so important to her if it was taken away from her she wouldn’t be the same.’ Whilst doctors await the results of Kayley’s scans, Gail explains she was forced to move from the tight knit community of the North East when the shipyards closed and her husband lost his job. She describes the poverty in the area at that time ‘There were long queues of men looking for work, there were long queues of women trying to buy provisions.’ The desire for a better life for her young family motivated her to ‘follow the work’ and move south. The risk paid off with Kayley pursuing her passion for animals, running a successful dog grooming business and buying a horse. Finally, Kayley’s scans confirm a severely dislocated hip and she’s rushed for emergency surgery to give her the best chance of walking normally again. Meanwhile, 23-year-old Receptionist, Melissa is having trouble hearing, and books an appointment with Emergency Nurse Practitioner, Craig. St George’s is like a ‘family business’ to her, with her mum, her sister, her cousin and her best friend all working on Reception at the hospital. Her dad was a paramedic, and met her mum whilst attending St George’s. Melissa explains that one day her father was admitted to resus in a critical condition while she was on shift. Despite the shock of dealing with such a personal tragedy at work, Melissa vowed to return to ensure she was there for other patients and their families in similar circumstances.