by Richard Ratzan, M.D.
Last week a patient died. It
was not on my watch. And he was a hopeless alcoholic whose death was a long
time a comin'. Yet his death has unhinged me and many - most - of my
colleagues, from nurses to doctors to aides - in a way that no other death has
affected an Emergency Department staff in my 40 years of practice. I did what I ordinarily do
when an event intrudes upon and usurps my consciousness - I analyzed it from
the perspective of a writer whose assignment it was to understand it well
enough to convey to a reader what and how and why it meant what it did for us.
For I intuitively realized that only when I could write about it for a reader
who did not know Jamie (name changed) would I have achieved clarity of
comprehension for myself.
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Rich Ratzan is a poet, classical scholar, ER doc and much more. He can be reached at: richratzanATyahoo.com