It isn't just about covid

I take xrays for a living.  In April, I will have been at my job for 25 years.  It blows people away that I have been there for so long.  I don't know why.  I kind of grew up in an age when that was to be expected and commended.  Longevity meant something.  Holy cow! I just realized that I am gonna be 50 this year and I have been taking xrays for half of my life.  lol!  Oh my stars!  lol!  Anyway...off to the reason for my post.

I am tired some days. Some days I am more tired than others. (I think part of it is because of my age. lol!)  Anyhoo!  We are two years into covid.  Two years.  I can honestly say that I am not tired because of covid.  Allow me to explain.  :)

Most people think of healthcare workers as nurses and doctors.  They are super important.  Life saving in fact.  Heroes even.  And in our area, with so much union talk, and how nurses are treated, you would honestly think they are the only people that work at our hospital.  Please be patient.  I am not a nurse/doctor hater.  Please continue to read my story.

I am one of many people that work at the hospital.  I even hate to begin to name the people that are involved in the care of one patient.  BUT!  Here I go.  Registration, respiratory, EVS (the folks that clean), lab, nutrition, ekg, radiology, transport, cna's, nurses, physicians, security, and just like that I am now drawing a blank. haha!

Did you know that radiology alone houses CT (computed tomography), NM (nuclear medicine), US (ultrasound), MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), and Diagnostic (plain film xrays).  There is also Specials (Interventional Radiology), but at our hospital they are not part of our department.  That is a lot of different specialties.  There is a minimum of a two year degree to do any of these (as far as I know).  We have a lot of schooling to do what we do. And a lot of math!  I hate math!  And science.  lol

Our hospital is an 815 bed hospital!  815!!  That is how many patients we can have! At the hospital!  Umm, the Emergency Room can hold 100 I believe.  Not sure if the 815 includes the 100 or not.  Either way.  That is a lot of patients.  On any given day there are 16 people working in just diagnostic xray.  (Right now that is a good day. lol)  If you divide 815 by 16 employees, that is a minimum of 50 patients per xray tech.  Nurses are busy.  They are short staffed in most areas.  Even up to 8 patients per nurse.  I am by no means comparing the two. (Well maybe I am a smidge.)  Anyway, we have a ton of patients!  A TON!!

Point of my story!  You know the first patient I ever xrayed, EVER, in the ER, as a first year student, was a little older woman who had reached over her stove and her little gown had caught on fire.  She was very badly burned.  I could not get that smell out of my nose.  I thought to myself..."I am not cut out for this".  I was in my mid 20's.  Oh my goodness.  I went home and cried.

Over time I went to work at the children's outpatient clinic at our hospital.  Oh man! That was the most rewarding part of my job that I ever had. Kids are amazing!  They handle pain and life long illness way better than adults.  Man I met some of the most precious humans.  One little boy had OI, osteogenesis imperfecta.  Oh he was precious, and so were his parents.  We saw him on multiple occasions.  But he was just brittle as can be.  One wrong move and we could break a bone so easily.  It was here, at the children's clinic, that I also learned the fine art of a "bone survey".  A bone survey is a series of images done on little ones who they mostly suspect have been abused.  (There is the rare occasion they do them for genetic disorders.)  This is my most proud yet most unsatisfying skill.  Oh I feel like I am pretty good at them but I despise that they exist.  Child abuse. It is an extremely ugly part of our society.  Eyes swollen shut, burns, bruises, and/or deformed body parts.  Oh I love those babies. I pray over them. I ask them where they live and tell them Aunt Neice will come take care of their abuser.  Don't worry. They are never old enough to tell me or to understand what I mean.  I would though.  I just talk to them.  I want them to feel loved, if even for the 30 minutes I have them.  I don't trust you when you come in with your child for that reason. I can't.  I am there for my patient.  I trust what their bones tell me.  Their bones tell the story.  They cry. I hold them.  (It is my consolation prize for making them take 20ish xrays.)  All the while wondering what horrors they have had to see at such a young age.  I love on them.  We see them. All of them.

Car accident, after construction accident, after fall accident.  Any trauma. You name it.  Traumas. We see all of them.  Shootings, stabbings, car accidents, fights, etc.  They are devastating.  A life cut short, or at the very least altered forever.  We see all of them.  I have had to xray a child that was shot (and died mind you and so did three others) and xray the shooter in the room next to them. I want you to understand that you are actually in the room with these patients. You do seem them take their last breath. You do it though.  It's what we do.  We see all of them.

I have had a patient with maggots crawling through their leg due to insufficient care from a wound.  Oh the smell.  Not good after lunch.  :(  You do it though. 

On one particular work day, there was a patient recently diagnosed with lung cancer, with sudden onset of difficulty breathing, and turns out fluid had filled one lung.  They were terrified.  Another young patient was so badly injured they wished for death.  Their injuries were from a car wreck that occurred well over a month ago. They didn't want to live anymore. They had multiple injuries. Another with cancer that was just in a terrible amount of pain. They just pushed through and did the xrays, no matter how painful. I held their hand (all of them) and told them I was sorry.  That we would get them taken care of and help them.  I left work and sat in my car and cried.

I am not telling these things so you will say "awe poor thing", "oh goodness I'm so sorry", "oh you are...blah blah whatever".  I tell you this because there is so much more to what I do than covid.  But while we are on it. I (WE, everyone in my department) do covid too. ALL the covid.  We visit every covid room in the hospital.  I can look at your xray and tell if you have covid and covid pneumonia. However, they are a small portion of what I do.

In addition to those very few I mentioned above, we also check pacemakers, pneumonia, pneumothorax, any broken bone in your body, line placements, arthritis, tube placements, swallow studies, aspiration, more cancers, and a ton of different surgery cases.  Hey, guess what, I have only mentioned what happens in the diagnostic portion of radiology....and that isn't even the half of it.

Sometimes I look at an xray and my heart sinks.  I look up at the patient and smile.  (Well not that you can see it that much anymore with masks.)  "Thank you so much honey. Hope you get to feeling better."  You offer a "is there anything else I can do for you before I go".  And off you go...to the next patient.  To the next heart wrenching story.

So my point?  We were tired before covid...not because of covid.  We are tired of jerks that beat up kids, people that do drugs, cancer, flu, obesity, car accidents, occupational accidents, diabetes, strokes, homelessness...I can't even begin to continue the list of what I am tired of.

   

Pictures for self promotional purposes. ;) I hate to sound rude but I am tired of the "whoa as me I am a healthcare worker during covid".  This!  This is our job!  This is what we chose to do.  Times have been tough off and on for years. There is an ebb and flow in healthcare.  Has been for years.  And now all of healthcare is for profit. 

Healthcare is hard. This is not new territory.  End of story.  Just go hug all the healthcare people you know.  Not just nurses and doctors.  It truly takes us all to help you and to get you the care you need.  And not just because of covid.  But because cancer sucks and there are mean people in the world.  Some days are just harder than others.  Much love to all those that work in healthcare.