(trigger warning-sensitive story)
I’ve felt life leave a body, in my hands.
It’s not something I’ll ever forget.
It was a 6 week old baby who came in to the ER for ‘a cough and being a little more sleepy today’. The baby was sleeping comfortably when they came in, and my initial thought was, “baby’s probably fine”. Then the baby started coughing, and couldn’t stop. It sounded like it was choking on it’s phlegm, gagging and coughing and trying to breathe all at the same time. The baby was definitely not fine. After struggling for what seemed an eternity, the baby caught it’s breath and went right back to sleep.
The second episode of this, the baby started turning blue while gagging and choking and trying to breathe. I picked up the baby and ran to the more acute part of the ER, screaming for people to make way for my patient. As I was running, I felt the baby getting more and more still and more and more cold. It actually started to feel lighter in my hands, like they were literally floating away from me. I screamed louder and ran faster. My team managed to intubate the baby and control it’s breathing.
Hours later, the diagnosis came back: Pertussis. Also known as whooping cough.
But no one was sick around the baby!
6 week old newborns are too young to get a pertussis vaccine; they get the first dose at 2 months. The baby was being visited by lots of relatives, some of whom had a little sniffle or slight cough, but ‘weren’t sick’. While expectant parents are instructed to get the pertussis vaccine for themselves, not all visitors are. Turns out in this case, it was a relative who had given the baby pertussis.
Just because you haven’t seen it, doesn’t mean the boogeyman of disease isn’t real.
Not many people have seen many of the diseases we vaccinate against these days, a great testament to their efficacy. But that doesn’t mean they’re not out there or that those of us who care for children haven’t seen and treated them. I’ve been doing this for 2 decades, I’ve treated thousands of kids. I’ve seen hundreds of kids requiring IV fluids at the brink of passing out from dehydration from Rotavirus. I’ve watched hundreds more struggle to breathe and wheeze violently from RSV. And I’ve seen kids with eczema have their skin be completely overtaken by chickenpox. Again, these kids don’t leave my memory. They inform my practice every day and make me champion for their health even more.
Last of my soapbox moment
I sometimes use this space to channel my own thoughts and share them with you all. I don’t expect any or all of you to agree with me, but I feel like sharing my own stories can at least inform you why I and so many other physicians feel and think and practice the way we do.
I hope it helps. Thanks for reading.
Take good care of yourselves and your loved ones.