24 Hours in A&E

61 year old Nicky is airlifted to St George’s by helicopter after a car mounted the pavement and ran her over whilst out walking. Doctors work quickly to get her into the CT scanner to ascertain the full extent of her injuries. Junior Doctor Raj explains “When you know a patient has bullseyed the front screen, it’s one of those cases you always know the pedestrian is on the losing team.” Nicky’s daughter Annie was on her way back from a horse competition when she found out about her Mum’s accident “as soon as I knew she was going to St. Georges, my whole idea of the accident changed. I thought we could lose her”. Whilst is being scanned, Nicky’s husband Richard talks about how when he first met Nicky she was going out with one of his friends, it was only after they split up that he got the chance to woo her in style “I wined and dined her for a couple of evenings, before being told the news that she was actually going out with someone else.” It was only weeks later his luck changed when she returned to tell him “I missed you, you made me laugh”. Daughter Annie, is the first child to arrive at hospital tells us how her mother has always been there for her “Mum gave up work when we were born, so she was the one that was there, every single time”. Richard tries hard to reassure and calm everyone, whilst Annie struggles to come to terms with her mother’s accident “how could this be happening to the one person I love most in life?” The results of Nicky’s scans show she has a fractured shoulder blade and spinal fractures. She is admitted to a ward for further observation. Meanwhile, 91 year old Sam arrives in Resus with a suspected stroke. He is accompanied by doting wife Roshan. Sam is unresponsive and doctors need to work quickly to get to the root cause of his symptoms. As Sam is assessed, we learn that he used to be a Pilot in the Royal Indian Air force, and met Roshan when he started work on commercial airlines “he started on the spitfires and ended on the jumbos”. Roshan describes meeting Sam when she worked as an Air Hostess, with Sam being 23 years older than her, her parents “were not at all pleased” with the age difference. Roshan talks of their life together and how when they first moved to London with Sam’s work “We used to walk around on foot and just admire all the old buildings and all the lovely history” We discover how Sam was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and Roshan talks bravely about the impact it has had on their lives “it strips a person of all their personality and their dignity” but glimmers of his cheeky demeanour still shine through. Meanwhile 4 month old Teddy has fallen out of his car seat face first onto concrete. Distraught Mum Lauren describes the scene: “his skin was going all blue and black from his feet up”. Teddy is struggling to move his neck, so Consultant Rhys is concerned he could have damaged his spine. Whilst Teddy has his x-ray we hear how Lauren has always wanted to be a Mum and how she went through a devastating miscarriage before having Teddy. Lauren’s Mum reflects on that tragic time and explains how children look to you to make things better “but sometimes you just can’t”.