Casualty

Matts on 2005-01-01T20:41:05

I forgot to mention in my earlier journal post that I managed to end up in A&E on Wednesday.

While taking a desk apart I managed to swing my arm around into a piece of right-angle metal that was meant for holding the table together. Normally when you bash bits of your body you expect one of two things - either it will just hurt and be grazed, or it will start bleeding in about 30 seconds. I started bleeding immediately, so I knew it was worse than your average damage.

Not wanting to go to casualty due to the usual waiting times there (average is about 3 hours) we called the doctor and got seen by the nurse in an hour and a half (all the while losing blood). She tried to hold it together with paper stitches but it just wasn't working - I had to go to A&E and get it properly stitched.

My most unusual experience ever at A&E - I got seen immediately! I was shocked. A very nice senior nurse called Michael gave me three stitches in my elbow and sent me packing within about 45 minutes.

I get to have the stitches out the day after I arrive in Canada. Lots of people have told me this is the most painful part (so far the only pain was tearing off the paper stitches which had stuck to my hair!). Hopefully I should be able to get this all done smoothly because my Permanent Resident's card and social security card arrived this week so I should be covered for health care.

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the most painful part

cog on 2005-01-01T21:01:59

Well, I guess it depends... if you're lucky, the rest of it won't hurt, and that's why it will be the most painful part... because of the two parts that hurt (the first one being the accident) it's the one you're able to anticipate :-)

I had an accident in 2000, in my bike... In one of my injuries, in my right hand, I had a guy literally scraping dead tissue from a part of my hand for about a week or so... and *that* was the most painful part... of my hand... because my leg was in a far worse condition than my hand... :-)

It's so great to be able to look into the past, at this sort of thing, and not feeling pain... :-)

Never rode a bicycle again, though... :-|

What's A&E?

petdance on 2005-01-02T03:35:34

What does A&E stand for? "A-something & Emergency"? Here in the States, A&E stands for "Arts & Entertainment", a cable TV channel.

Re:What's A&E?

merlyn on 2005-01-02T04:11:35

Oh good, not just me!

I was thinking "Matt got on TV for having a body pain?"

Maybe they were doing a special on people getting hurt though. {grin}

Re:What's A&E?

Matts on 2005-01-02T08:36:36

Accident and Emergency. Funny as I thought this was an Americanism that we adopted since we used to call it "Casualty".

Re:What's A&E?

merlyn on 2005-01-02T12:40:33

Ahh... we just call it "the emergency room".

The trick is to look really sick

grantm on 2005-01-02T10:26:53

I only had one experience of A&E in the UK. I was doubled over with abdominal pain and was dreading a lengthy wait, but they saw I had real problems and saw me almost immediately. So I guess the worse you look, the shorter you wait.

It probably would have looked bad on their monthly stats report if you'd 'bled out' while waiting.

Re:The trick is to look really sick

Matts on 2005-01-02T21:47:18

Ah, well I was stood at reception dripping blood onto the floor. That might have done it.