night 3 almost over, a steady (but not hectic) night.

just a string of small tasks really, but kept me going along all night. an arterial line change here, a nasogastric tube drop there, that kinda thing.

new admission to the unit... 33 yearold guy with left ventricular variant of arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia that arrested outside a neuro ward upstairs, having wandered over there after climbing two floors from his own cardiac ward. even though he has an implantable cardiac defibrillator inside him, the device didnt seem to kick in on the settings he had. he was down for just under 2 hours, with around 40 minutes of full circulatory arrest. his brother has already died of arvd, many more family members are currently undergoing familial genetic studies. already starting to show signs of cerebral hypoxia after being down for so long, i had to load him with phenytoin to terminate what looked like generalised seizures. fascinating case, but not good. =(

and yet another general icu patient taking up one of our beds! a young mother with grade 4 metastatic ovarian, had debulking under gynaecology, then developed pericardial and bilateral pleural effusions on general icu... came to us just before christmas for possible pericardial window, which wasnt actually needed as it turned out, so went back to general icu... and now back with us for renal failure and haemofiltration.

didnt really have time to catch up on news tonight. never mind. =/

food of the night:

prawn and courgette stir fry, mashed potato

posted by Chas at 19:02
go ahead, roll the donut!