That crunchy feeling...
Sometimes I go to attend to a patient at their home and the senses are assaulted before I've even entered the property. Yesterday was just such a day.
We were called to help an elderly male who had collapsed just inside the front door to his flat, and who was preventing anybody from entering because he was lying just inside the doorway. The patient was a known diabetic.
I'm not thin - but I'm not too fat either, so I managed to squeeze my frame in and around the available gap in the doorway and entered.
It's strange how your eyes give you an amazing amount of visual information in a few seconds. The floor of the property and every surface was covered in dust, detritus, mould and rotting food. The occupant was obviously unable to care for himself.
Then the smell hit me.
Now, I'm not one of those people who baulks at the aroma of things most people find offensive. It's an occupational hazard that quite often I'll find my olfactory senses challenged on a regular occurence, whether it's urine, vomit, faeces or gangene. However, the smell that greeted me yesterday was a new one to my nose.
Looking down to the floor where the patient was lying I could see the pattern of the carpet moving. People pay good money to have such hallucinatory experiences, I believe. Looking closer I could now see that the movement was being caused by the wriggling of maggots. Lots of them. Piles of dark red pupal casings were scattered everywhere.
That explains the abundance of flies in the property, thought I.
The patient had been lying on the floor for over 24 hours, according to one of his neighbours who was being a bit too helpful to be useful (bystanders are often a bit too helpful to be useful in this job!) His weight and general poor health were preventing him from being able to get back on his feet. His collapse was probably non diabetic related.
A second crew was needed to assist with the lift onto our vehicle. This plan of action had been arrived at after the fifth attempt to lift him into a carry chair had failed, amidst much sweating and muttered swearing from my colleague and myself.
At hospital the patient was found to have rather nasty sores to his private parts (both the front bits and the rear bit), but there were no other obvious injuries. We left him in the capable hands of the nursing staff.
The smell that had greeted me on arrival had permeated my uniform and remained for the rest of the shift. All ten hours of it...
We were called to help an elderly male who had collapsed just inside the front door to his flat, and who was preventing anybody from entering because he was lying just inside the doorway. The patient was a known diabetic.
I'm not thin - but I'm not too fat either, so I managed to squeeze my frame in and around the available gap in the doorway and entered.
It's strange how your eyes give you an amazing amount of visual information in a few seconds. The floor of the property and every surface was covered in dust, detritus, mould and rotting food. The occupant was obviously unable to care for himself.
Then the smell hit me.
Now, I'm not one of those people who baulks at the aroma of things most people find offensive. It's an occupational hazard that quite often I'll find my olfactory senses challenged on a regular occurence, whether it's urine, vomit, faeces or gangene. However, the smell that greeted me yesterday was a new one to my nose.
Looking down to the floor where the patient was lying I could see the pattern of the carpet moving. People pay good money to have such hallucinatory experiences, I believe. Looking closer I could now see that the movement was being caused by the wriggling of maggots. Lots of them. Piles of dark red pupal casings were scattered everywhere.
That explains the abundance of flies in the property, thought I.
The patient had been lying on the floor for over 24 hours, according to one of his neighbours who was being a bit too helpful to be useful (bystanders are often a bit too helpful to be useful in this job!) His weight and general poor health were preventing him from being able to get back on his feet. His collapse was probably non diabetic related.
A second crew was needed to assist with the lift onto our vehicle. This plan of action had been arrived at after the fifth attempt to lift him into a carry chair had failed, amidst much sweating and muttered swearing from my colleague and myself.
At hospital the patient was found to have rather nasty sores to his private parts (both the front bits and the rear bit), but there were no other obvious injuries. We left him in the capable hands of the nursing staff.
The smell that had greeted me on arrival had permeated my uniform and remained for the rest of the shift. All ten hours of it...
posted by PikeNovice at
7:47 AM
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