specialty focus
Photo : Jodi Nash
“ Like many night staff , she was frozen in the year she last lived in daylight .
Telling it like it is
An edited extract from Georgie Carroll ’ s book , Off the charts .
By Georgie Carroll
I
was on the morning shift taking over from a graduate nurse just finishing his first seven-night run in his first year of nursing . He had re-sprayed his deodorant and brushed his hair and his teeth for handover . I have been on dates with my husband where he has not put in that much effort . He read his handover from a script , so he did not miss a thing .
“ Bed 7 is Peter ; he is a 37-year-old gentleman with a six-year history of frequent admissions to hospital with ulcerative colitis , anxiety and depression . He presented to the Emergency department last night with abdominal pain and sepsis . He was rushed to theatre ; he had a perforated bowel . They have done a massive resection and they had to give him a colostomy . He had a settled night on morphine sub cut . Every admission , his biggest anxiety has been that he would need a colostomy . He does not know about it yet , but the surgeons will be around in the morning to tell him .”
The mornings team leader had not turned up , so I got moved to that role , meaning I got handover again . This time from the night-time shift leader , Liz , a nurse who had been on permanent nights for over 30 years .
Liz ’ s permanent nights contract had been issued to her in 1983 on account of being a single parent with school-aged children . Liz was the last house standing ; all her night-nurse colleagues ’ contracts had been demolished . Management had for years tried to oust her from her nights . Their argument being that if they let Liz work only at night , then everybody would want to . Never had management been less in touch with what staff were wanting .
Like many night staff , she was frozen in the year she last lived in daylight . Liz had matted hair , the face of a Toby jug and the frame of a toffee apple . If working in a hospital teaches you nothing else , it teaches you that a person ’ s outward appearance is no indication as to their usefulness . She was absolutely the nurse you needed around when a patient deteriorated at night with only skeleton staff to revive them .
Anyway , the handover . She had not brushed her teeth or hair for handover , or perhaps for many years . She was in the middle of her seven-night run threequarters of the way through a 48-year roster . Imagine if you will , this handover delivered with Liz ’ s broad Liverpuddlian accent .
“ Bed 7 , Peter . You know Peter , scabby bowel , a right soft cock . Anyway , came in last night and you will never guess what ? His bowel has finally burst , surprise , surprise ? Anyway , if they had chopped a couple of miles of it out and chucked it in the bin like they should have done two years ago then they wouldn ’ t have had to move his arsehole to his abdomen like that . He ’ s never been that taken with the idea of a stoma and he didn ’ t know about it pre-op , so we ’ ve not told him , kept him asleep with morphine . Surgeons will be round in the morning to tell him .”
Liz is indeed a lyrical gangster ; she stuck a little cherry on the top . “ Pffff , surgeons will be around in the morning ? But I ’ ll give him my arsehole if we see them before teatime .”
None are immune to these character modulations ; it is a necessary hardening . Even I , the cheeriest of all the nurses , have had to adapt .
In my early days , I would cry and remain solemn for the rest of the shift every time I laid someone out after death . I could not keep that up ; it got on the other nurses ’ nerves and solemn does not suit me . I stopped the tears , but I still wanted to honour the recently dead in some way so after family and friends had visited , I would open a window so their soul could fly out . There came a point where I could no longer even do that as the hospitals had decided to glue windows shut .
I have adapted to the hospital culture and practice of not chattering away about trite things during the washing , combing and shrouding . It still feels significant for the most part . I admit , however , that if I feel that someone had no one , or that I had a special connection with them , I will leave an open bottle in the room for the soul to hop into before the body is transported to the morgue , and then take the bottle outside so the soul can go wherever it needs to .
Please do the same for me should I die in your care , just in case the afterlife is a thing . ■
Off the Charts by Georgie Carroll is published by Pan Macmillan .
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