Merely the patient

I sometimes wondered what there is about the atmosphere of a hospital that makes everybody prevaricate. If you ask what your temperature is you get an evasive or dishonest answer; if you ask a civil question about yourself, or anybody, or anything whatsoever, they all—including your own people—seem leagued together in a solemn compact to deceive you. And they justify their deceit on the ground that truthful answers are “bad for the morale of the patient,” who is supposed to submit to everything without question, obey all orders without objection, and interfere with no local procedure. You hire the doctor, suffer all the torments, and pay all the bills; yet you are given but little occasion to feel that you are in any other respect regarded as a human entity. You are merely a patient—known in hospital parlance by the number on the door of your room. If you ask an intelligent question about your own condition, the answer makes you feel as if you were prying into their affairs. If you are feverish and irritable, and feel anxiety and suspicion because you are being obviously deceived, you must content yourself with believing that your attendants think they know better than you about your condition and what is good for you.

The first night at the Kahler hospital, my nurse on retiring said she was a light sleeper, and to call her when I wanted anything in the night. She would get up at seven and go to breakfast. Under a strong opiate I slept fairly well through the latter part of the night, and waking a little before seven, with a throbbing hip, and parched mouth and throat, I attempted to wake her for a glass of water (her bed was behind a screen across the room).

“Miss Page!” I called in a loud whisper. No answer. Then louder—“Miss Page!” Still no answer.... “Miss Page, did you say you were a light sleeper?” About that time I felt like sneezing; and, I thought, “if I can put this over strong it will surely bring her to.” So I drew in a tremendous inhalation and let out a blast that seemed to shake the room. When the reverberations had died away I listened, and the death-like silence gave me a quaky feeling.

Becoming alarmed, I reached for the telephone on the stand beside my bed and asked the operator to ring my bell vigorously, as I couldn’t wake my nurse. The ensuing clatter sounded like a fire alarm.

“My God, the woman’s dead!” I thought. When I could stand the noise and suspense no longer I cut in and called to the operator—“Send someone up quick; there’s a dead nurse in my room!”

In a short time there was a rush of feet coming along the corridor, then the door was opened, the lights flashed on and several excited people ran in.

“Behind the screen!” I said. They all scurried across to the scene of the supposed fatality. But the bed was empty! Half an hour later the nurse came in smiling. “I got up early,” she said, “and slipped out while you were asleep. Did you miss me?”

We now approach the scenes that bordered narrowly on tragedy. Strangely enough I had had much to do with tragedies the past year. I read twenty-one of them by Æschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, but little did I dream how near I was to becoming the central figure in a tragic drama with a modern hospital setting.

A couple of days or so after the nurse episode Dr. Braasch came to see me. He said he was making a special study of my case, and for some time he listened attentively while I endeavored to explain how I felt. For the first time I was encouraged to find that I had finally impressed someone with the idea that all was not going well. With the parting remark that he would call again in a few hours, he went out, leaving me in a state of wonderment as to what the next move would be. A little later, when Doctor Will made his customary morning call, he talked at unusual length about the operation. He said his first impression on seeing the infected kidney was to remove it; but on second thought, and acting on the advice of his assistants, he decided to try to save it. Therefore after spending nearly two hours cleaning out and repairing it he stitched it up, put it back and sewed up the incision. He still felt that his second judgment was correct. I disagreed with him, for I continued to grow steadily worse.

“Doctor, that kidney must have died of the operation. I wish to God you had taken it out and thrown it into the sewer; then I should have been well rid of it,” I said in despair. “I’m poisoned, I tell you, I’m poisoned!”

But in his calm dialectical way he went on to explain several reasons justifying his action, and others accounting for my condition. Finally he convinced me that he was right; that my condition was only a natural outcome of such an operation, and all I had to do was set my mind on getting well. After he left I called in the family and said we’d play auction bridge; that what I needed was action and diversion. They were thunderstruck at seeing me climb out of bed and call for my dressing gown and slippers. Though my head was in a constant whirl we played for an hour, when Doctor Braasch came in and dropped into a chair, looking rather troubled.