Letting Go With Dr Rodriguez. Fiona Lowe

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СКАЧАТЬ head into a neutral line. She needed to apply a cervical collar, but to do that she needed to sit her upright. Ideally, it was a two-person job.

      Hurry up, Marco.

      Airway comes first. She knew she didn’t have time to wait, especially when she had no clue how far away help was from arriving. ‘Geraldine, I’m going to move—’

      ‘What’s her condition?’

      Thank you. Lucy had never been so pleased to hear a Spanish accent in her life and she swivelled her head around in relief. Intelligent, dark brown eyes filled with a host of medical questions gazed at her, backlit with care and concern.

      A odd, fleeting half-thought amidst the chaos of the moment made her wonder how it might feel to be the focus of that sort of caring.

      She brushed it aside as completely irrelevant. ‘She’s conscious, although only just, and given her pulse rate, probably bleeding somewhere. We need to treat her as a possible spinal injury.’

      Marco nodded and tugged on the door which shifted, giving them a bit more room, but they’d need a lot more to get Geraldine out of the car. He turned and yelled to the police sergeant, ‘Graham, we need this door off.’

      ‘On it.’

      Lucy heard Graham on his two-way radio to the fire brigade and then Marco moved in next to her, filling the cramped space with his clean, fresh citrus scent and the welcome support of professional reinforcement. ‘Geraldine, this is Marco. We’re going to carefully sit you up and protect your neck.’

      The woman groaned without forming any words.

      Lucy continued in triage mode. ‘Marco, you support her mid-thorax and I’ll support her neck. On my count. One, two, three.’

      They sat Geraldine up and then without being asked, Marco passed Lucy the cervical collar.

      ‘This will support your neck, Geraldine.’ She quickly wrapped it into position.

      ‘Lucy, take this.’

      She turned and Marco held out the equipment she needed to attach Geraldine to the Propaq so they could monitor her vital signs. ‘Thanks.’

      He nodded. ‘I’ll insert the IV.’

      ‘Sorry, Geraldine, but I have to rip your shirt.’ The woman’s eyes flickered open and shut again. Lucy tugged at the buttons on the blouse and they came open and she applied the patches to the woman’s skin. A moment later, the machine beeped into life. ‘BP’s low. Two lines would be good.’

      ‘Oxygen too.’ He shoved the green mask and plastic tubing into her hands and then he returned to his task, his forehead scored deep with worry lines. He quietly reassured a barely conscious Geraldine while his fingers moved up and down her arm seeking a viable vein. He tightened the tourniquet and tried again.

      Lucy wanted to watch, wanted to will a vein to appear but she knew it wouldn’t help. Her job was to check Geraldine’s pupils’ reaction to light and hopefully rule out a head injury. They each did their job, working as a team and pooling their body of knowledge as they scrambled to stabilise their patient. They spoke few words, but the ones they voiced locked together to build a synchronicity that flowed between them.

      ‘IV is in.’

      ‘Great. Push fluids.’

      Marco pumped in a litre of Hartmann’s through the hard-won IV line in a furious attempt to bring up Geraldine’s blood pressure.

      Blocking out the bleating of sheep and all other extraneous noises, Lucy moved her stethoscope around Geraldine’s chest. The woman was taking short, shallow breaths and her pulse-ox numbers stayed low despite the help of the oxygen. ‘I think she’s got a tension pneumothorax.’

      Marco’s frown deepened. He handed the bag of Hartmann’s to a bystander saying, ‘Hold it high.’

      The young man nodded and did as he was asked while Marco passed gloves, antiseptic and a large bore needle to Lucy. ‘Needle decompression.’

      Lucy snapped on the gloves and sloshed the brown antiseptic onto Geraldine’s skin. ‘Second intercostal space at the level of the angle of Louis.’

      ‘Sí. Then gentle traction on the plunger and checking for air bubbles.’

      Lucy knew it all, but saying it out loud to a colleague and hearing confirmation always helped. ‘And then an immediate relief of symptoms.’

      I hope. Her fingers located the position and she pressed the needle into place, praying the needle wouldn’t block. The beeping of the monitor faded.

      ‘Beuno, you’re in. Pulse-ox is rising now.’ The relief in Marco’s deep voice vibrated around them, matching her own. ‘Leave the needle open.’

      ‘Yep, had planned to.’ The rush of a good save flowed through her. Although Geraldine wasn’t out of the woods yet, at least they’d sorted out one big problem.

      The sensation lasted ninety seconds.

      The sharp and incessant beeping of the Propaq rose again, screaming at them as their patient’s heart rate soared and her blood pressure plummeted. For the briefest moment, Marco’s gaze met hers and she had an overwhelming moment of connection, unlike anything she’d ever experienced with a colleague.

      Their words collided as they both yelled out in unison, ‘Jaws of life now!’

      CHAPTER THREE

      THE emergency helicopter banked and quickly headed south towards Perth, taking the deafening noise of the rotors with it, and exposing the continual bleating of injured and scared sheep. Marco ran his hand through his hair and glanced at Lucy. They’d worked side by side for over an hour and he still had the alluring scent of her perfume in his nostrils. Call him overtired, but he’d swear it was a combination of vanilla and liquorice. At first he’d breathed in deeply, using the scent as a shield when the smell of blood and fear had threatened to choke him. After that, he’d just wanted her scent—wanted it badly, like a smoker needed his next cigarette.

      Lucy was staring down at her feet and her smooth and sleek hair fell forward across her cheeks like a curtain, masking her face and masking her emotions. Not that it mattered—even when he could see her expressions, he couldn’t work her out. Today, she’d been a totally different person from yesterday, running the emergency expertly and efficiently, and without any of the high drama and emotion that had been on display in the practice. She knew her medicine and he’d been grudgingly impressed. Given the difficult conditions, they’d worked together well, anticipating each other’s needs as if they’d worked together for years. All he had to do now was think of her in terms of a doctor rather than a woman and his life could return to normal. How hard could that be?

      As if she could sense his gaze on her, she raised her head, tucked her hair behind her ears and attempted a smile, only the accompanying tension thwarted it. ‘It’s going to be touch and go, isn’t it?’

      He nodded, sharing the exact same concerns for Geraldine. ‘It is, but together we’ve given her a chance. Thank goodness the accident happened in the town because otherwise …”

      ‘Yeah.’ СКАЧАТЬ