An extended tour in Vietnam (part two)
Coming in the back door of Franco Vietnamese Hospital in HCM City undersells it a bit. When the ambulance driver dropped me off I no longer got wheelchair escort, and I was taken to a curtained room in the emergency ward. My IV was empty and Laura was taken away from me. All in all, my first impression of this hospital where I was soon to be cut open wasn’t fantastic.
That changed when a nurse came to try to rescue my failing IV line, chatted with me a bit, and finally gave up and re-needled me. She explained the advantages of having another line in my wrist vs. the crook of my elbow, which would hurt less but severely restrict movement. I went with the wrist, which hurt more than the other two I’d had in that day, but was happy with the choice as I remained attached to this one for 36 hours.
The French doctor who came to see me to confirm my appendicitis, need for surgery, and empty stomach was friendly, intelligent and had recently been to Missouri. He explained we’d dot the surgery at twois-heur (3:00), to be sure my belly was empty. At this point I still didn’t really understand that I’d be in the hospital for a few days. As the nurse put it, the good thing about being hospitalized is that you get an excuse to lay around and do nothing.
About an hour later I was moved into a double room to await surgery. At this point I got to be with Laura again, who had been stuck in the waiting room up to that point. The nurses came in and gave me a cup of iodine soap and sort of mimed for me to wash myself with it. The bathroom in this room, however, had no lights. After waiting for 30 minutes or so to get someone to change the light, they finally escorted me across the hall to another room with a working bathroom light. The nurse who escorted me answered my questions with miming. I wasn’t sure if I was to wash just the surgery area, take a shower, wash my whole body with the iodine (betamine?) soap, or what. I asked some questions, and she mimed washing everywhere, then pointed to the cup and her mouth and shook her head NO!. Okay, don’t drink the soap, no problem.
Showering with an IV in is a bit difficult, but I figured it out, got cleaned up, and went to await surgery. Roughly one hour later, they came to take me away. As I was being whisked into the surgery area, we passed the surgeon who said “See you soon, very soon!” which the orderlies transporting me both repeated enthusiastically. Everyone in the hospital is eager to improve their English, which results in some awkward conversations when you’re the only native English speaker(s) in the building. (More later)
The OR was like any I’d seen in the movies, complete with a somewhat sadistic looking table, bright lights, fancy equipment, and an air-locked door. One nurse secured my IV with a few extra layers of tape, I was disrobed and covered with a light blanket under which was inserted a heat blowing tube to keep me warm in the cold OR. The anesthetist showed up in the room and said, “OK, I make you sleepy now!” I was relieved. I think at this point he gave me some gas, I remember vaguely inhaling through a respirator of some sort, but that may not be the case. They didn’t insert anything in to my IV to my knowledge, so it must be. Anyhow, I woke up two and a half hours later in a haze.
The one injection of morphine I got didn’t do much to ease the pain, and I asked the nurse still there if I could have more. “Good to use, bad for abuse.” Good call I suppose, but my gut still hurt like hell. The more effective pain relief was when he came back in a few moments later, when I was a few notches more lucid, to discuss the Democratic primary. Apparently everyone in Vietnam favors Hillary because she is not black. I assured him that Obama would be a much better president for the US and for the world.
After stabilizing I was brought out of the surgery ward and up to my new room. Laura, thank God, had managed to get us a single room where she was waiting for me.
Begin recovery…
