Monday, April 4, 2011

Must be new ...

"Spook, lab's holding on 5-oh".

I immediately rush over from the emergent-foot-pain-for-four-months-at-3-in-the-am patient to take what could be an important call with life altering critical lab values.

"ER, this is Spook how can I help you?"

Excited hyper-voiced lab dude: "Good Day Spook! I have a critical lab value for you!"

Who the hell has critic... oh wait!
Only person I'm expecting anything to show up on is drunk-hooker-chick who comes in about once every other week, for the past 8+ years, for the same reason - acute alcohol intoxication (sometimes with SI thrown in for variety).

So without any preamble, I ask "so what's her BAL (Blood Alcohol Level)?"
Excited not-so-hyper voiced lab dude: "Oh! How did you... anyway, it's 299!" [roughly 3 times the legal limit].
Me: "That's it? *snort* Business must be hard... Thanks lab dude."

Poor kid! Getting all excited about a BAL of 299 ... on drunken-hooker-chick no less! Obviously he hasn't met our other heavyweights.

I give the kid 2 weeks...

I set the phone down and walked into the med room to procure some STAT Motrin to administer to the emergent-foot-pain-for-four-months ...

2 comments:

LearningByReading said...

Missed the thread somewhere. Do u work ER?

Spook, RN said...

Yep. A (very) busy Level II trauma center....