Deep Trauma

Riley ripped off her bloody gloves and crossed the room to call the surgical suites again. She and her team had done what they could, including starting the massive transfusion protocol. But without surgical intervention to control bleeding, all that newly transfused blood would ultimately just end up on the floor.

As if on cue, the senior trauma surgeon and her team strode in; she breathed a sigh of relief as she laid eyes on Riley.

“God, I was hoping you were here today, Rye. I knew you would handle whatever it was—thank you, thank you,” she said, pulling on a pair of gloves to examine the patient’s wound, which Riley had packed with gauze.

“Thanks, Krista. It was touch and go there for a minute with a tension pneumo on the left, but I had good help from Burt and, of course, Sonya, who’s always a rock star in the worst cases. Every pair of hands helped.” The lanky intern glanced over his shoulder then from the bedside, where he was doing his best to appear useful while Sonya secured a large dressing around the chest tube site. Riley couldn’t help but draw a parallel between the look in his eyes and the one she so often saw in Indio’s when Artemis had just reminded him of his position in the pecking order.

Within minutes, the trauma team was whisking the patient off to the operating room, crimson transfusion bags swinging from the IV poles on the gurney and an entourage of support staff and medical trainees in tow.

Riley stood in the middle of the vacant trauma bay looking down at the pools of congealing blood at her feet, the victim’s shredded clothing—cut off to allow for thorough examination—and a myriad of surgical supply wrappers littering the floor.

She felt numb, as if somehow the world was a little slower and duller in the wake of all the commotion. She thought about all the resources being poured into saving the young man’s life and how long and difficult his recovery might be—and whether or not he would make it through surgery. And then there were the bigger questions, the ones she seldom deliberated because they could be so crushing. If the patient survived, would he just return to the same environment where he was bound to be a victim again? Would he, next time, perhaps be the shooter?

She headed for the break room, her head buzzing, hoping someone had had time to brew a fresh pot of coffee. Trauma cases were always such a paradox—emotionally draining but somehow also energizing. There was an indescribable peace, a flow of clarity best described as a singularity that came from navigating multiple streams of dynamic data in the middle of a disaster.

Today, she could honestly say her team had done well in their management of the patient’s injuries. There was no question they had all played a part in executing a lifesaving intervention. And for those things, she should have been grateful. But that’s not what she felt. What she felt was lucky, and that was cold comfort to anyone in her profession. Because no one was lucky all the time.