For those who know me personally know what I do for a living and for those who don't well the following probably gives it away.....
Usually my work shifts see the same illness, injuries, traumas, diseases etc; however on the odd occasion I do come across some interesting and also weird cases in the last 9 years of doing this. Like a sunbeam iron imprint burnt onto a man's chest by his wife, removing an orange from the ass of a man dressed in a gimp suit and seeing two fish hooks, one caught in the right testicle and the other in the meatus of a sorry looking fellow; last night's agency shift events leading onto today falls into the latter category of interesting, weird and includes stupidity.
So I am working triage at a hospital that will remain unnamed, a man holding a potato sack and accompanying a teenage boy present themselves to the counter. The man states that he and he's son have been bitten by a snake, his son twice and himself once. Before I get to ask a question the boy immediately projectile vomits all over the front screen (thank fuck for double layered glass; otherwise I would be wearing vomit) so with that in mind; I hit the resus alarm and rush the boy and his father into the resus room.
Since the boy is symptomatic he gets treated first, put the boy monitor to get his body's parameters, stick in a cannula, hook him up to a drip and anti administer an intravenous anti emetic (drug that stops nausea and vomiting) other staff are currently attending to the father. The boy appears to settle within a minute, its good shit that works fast! So I move back onto the father to question him about snake (to identify the correct antivenom).
As I questioning the man whilst he is lying on the resus bed, I feel something move on my leg. I look down and noticed the potato sack that the man was holding previously was now lying on my left foot. I'm thinking to myself perhaps I bumped it accidentally so I gently push it back with my foot under the resus bed and forgot about it for a moment.
The gent tells gives me the history, his son was out in the paddock stepped on a snake and then it bit him on his right shine; he started screaming and I came running towards him. I asked my son what type of snake it was, he said he looked black, he wasn't sure; so I started looking around the immediate area and I spotted something moving in the thick grass. As I got closer I felt something bite my left shine, oh fuck I got bitten by the snake as well; I looked down and the snake was trying to break grasp from under my foot. I still wasn't sure what type of snake it was and it was happening so quickly, I picked him up and then it bit my L hand.
I then grabbed his head with my right hand carried the snake and my son back to the house, I put the snake into a potato sack and I stuck them both in the car and drove to the hospital. At this stage I was wtf (i just pushed a snake that was in a potato sack further under the bed). Trying to remain composed I grabbed a broom from the cleaners room managed to pull and lift the potato sack and dropped it into an infants incubator. I am on the phone next to anesthetics asking to the bring down a bottle of Halothane (ie nitrous) so I can smoke up the incubator full of it.
Not going to take any chances to determine whether it dead or alive in order to identify it properly; as I am smoking up the incubator the radiographer gingerly walking by looks at the incubator at amazement and ask whats in the sack, told him a snake, his immediate response was "can I x-ray it?" If you like after I identify it, but I want a copy later. After a few minutes of Halothane, I open the sack up, it was a "red belly black snake".
Both Son and father had Tiger snake venom administered and the father was also administered a double ear bashing.
Oh and meet the third patient; "Snakey S"
Yeah I like Kawasakis.
