Doctor, we have received a patient unresponsive, in severe respiratory distress. Hey, just call resp. therapy, and call me when my foothockeybasketbaseball game is over on the HD. Hey doctor, she is not breathing anymore-want to assess your patient now?!?! Dammit nurse-I cannot see her in here? All right-hey where is all the equipment gone to? Well doctor, they took it to the gym, for the mock disaster drill, with the rest of the staff. It is just you and me--poor patient.
Dammit nurse, just get me my doctor's bag, and I will save this poor spirit. Doctor your bag has only expensive booze, a stethoscope, and a Montblanc pen. Hey nurse, that is all you need in this high stress life of an ER doctor. Now let me listen to her lungs-ah yes she is not breathing-can you ambu her for me nurse? Now I can assess her better. Hey, I just need my gin and pen, and she will be breathing in no time flat. Doctor-I saw this on an episode of MASH- you are going to trach her?! N, you silly nurse. Just watch and be amazed by my great medical skillz! I take a mouthful of booze-ah refreshing, and I unscrew my pen-she will be billed for a new one! I blow alcohol on the parts and just shove them into the sides of her chest-like chest tubes and re-inflate those lugs of hers. Doctor, if that is what she needed, chest tubes, we could have easily done bilateral needle decompressions at the second rib space, midclavicular line. Where on earth, did you learn with crazy procedure doctor!?! Well, it was in my new manga series, I am reading on breaks from my naps.
Nurse faints......
Yes, this procedure is shown, in detail-graphically in this manga. The craziness of this series, is well balanced by the humanity the main character brings to medicine and the University Hospital in Japan. Get sick in a foreign country, and you so will discover how well we do medicine in the USA. Princess Diana was on scene way too long and no trauma centers in Paris. They did even have a medivac Helicopter to send to scene-with trauma trained staff to assist. Sure, she would have probably not overcome her head trauma, but that golden hour of trauma was spent on scene.
I highly recommend this slice of life of the Japanese medical system-though a little dated-to see how patients are treated elsewhere.