Once again I found myself ringing in the New Year with co-workers. Not that they’re not fun to be around, but it’s not like I can dance and kiss them at midnight.
It’s funny though to watch the admissions though the night. Until midnight, there was nothing. The ED was dead. Just a couple of the usual detritus of abdominal pain, nausea/vomiting and the requisite psych hold. But after midnight it was all ETOH-related. ETOH/Fall, knee injury, ETOH, fall with back pain and since I was in charge of the observation unit as well that night, I was getting the calls.
“Yeah, we need an obs bed for a “syncope” patient.” said the house supervisor
“Syncope huh? You mean falling down drunk, right?”
And the night continued like that. Syncope chick tested positive for coke, ETOH, a UTI and Trich. But denied that she drank, takes drugs or smokes (we didn’t go into the sleeping around part…) I learned that you could test positive for coke just by being around people smoking meth! I never knew!
All in all it was much the same as every other night. But for a New Year, with a full moon it could have been much worse.
