Escorting patient

It was Sunday, 29th November 2009. I was not oncall/working. I was lepaking in my room, half naked enjoying the weekend while listening to Elvis Presley CD. I just bought this CD a day earlier.

Then, i received an unexpected call from my colleague.

DrF: Bond..ada 1 baby with gastroschisis la..perlu hantar ke Kota Kinabalu..
Me: hantar la g KK..
DrF: perlu doctor escort la..baby tak cukup bulan..berat 1.9kg..DrC and DrO oncall hari ni..aku oncall esok..DrR cuti..bos pun cuti..ko jer yang free..
Me:..ala..tak kan nak gi KK..aku baru jer balik dari KK..
DrF: ala boleh la..
Me:ok la ok la..semua dah arrange ker??
DrF: DAH!. Nanti driver sampai pukul 11am.

That's it!!! my weekend is spoiled. I have to go to KK today escorting patient.
I got up..and get dressed and start packing.
By 11am, i was at the hospital and straight away to the nursery ward.
Nursery ward.
There, i met a cute and small little girl. She has gastroschisis.
The girl.
Gastroschisis is condition where the baby was born with a defect over her abdomen (tummy). When there is a defect, there is a hole where the bowels can come out. It is a surgical emergency and this patient needs urgent transfer for immediate operation.


Looking at the patient case note, i was surprised that she was admitted last night. Now it's almost 11am, the arrangement for the transfer still not yet complete.
The arrangement is important. Before leaving the hospital, we have to make sure that our equipment, medication, oxygen , xrays, letters etc etc are complete. We don't want when we are in the middle of Borneo jungle..then we just realized that the oxygen tank is empty!!!. Thats will be disastrous and unfortunately it does happened before.
One of my colleague escorted a patient to KK and she forgot to bring the patient's xray. After arrived in KK, she got very "nice" remarks from the doctor there.
The ambulance.
Getting ready. The oxygen tank is empty. I asked the driver to get a new one.
About to leave..
After everything was arranged, we left Sandakan Hospital at 1.30pm.
The captain..Mr Miki.
During the journey, this baby is at risk of developing these conditions:

• hypoglycaemia...blood sugar become low..
• hypothermia..baby temperature goes down..
• apnoea..baby can't breathe properly and her oxygen concentration in the blood goes down.

These 3 conditions can be fatal. Hence, during the tranfer she was keep inside a incubator/container. This incubator has temperature monitoring and we can adjust the temperature accordingly.
Baby inside her "space station".
She also was connected to continuos pulse rate and saturation monitoring.
When she can't breathe, the saturation monitoring will goes down..alerting us to do something quick.
The monitor.
She was closely monitored during the entire journey and all her clinical data were recorded.
Baby is sleeping.
The mama and my nurse.
As expected, the journey was bumpy. The road in Sabah was not like in the "west". The road is small, and "berbelit-belit".
We were passing jungles, kampongs , rivers and hills.
Enroute to Telupid.
A river, enroute to Ranau.
A river.
Before reaching Ranau.
It's jungle out there!!
Ranau..a kampong
Leaving ?Ranau..I forgot where is this place
Kundasang.
Kundasang
Kundasang
We just left Kundasang, going to Tamparuli,,then i saw this..

It's a rainbow!!
Despite it was raining almost during the entire journey, we reached KK safely at 6.30pm.
Almost there..this is Tamparuli.
We headed to Likas Hospital and transferred this baby there.
Lets go.
Finally..
Good bye baby..be a good girl.
We left the hospital by 7pm and immediately i asked the driver to go to the airport. I wanted to catch a last flight to Sandakan...but it was too late. Instead i was given a flight to Sandakan the next day..I have to go back as soon as possible, as the next is Monday, and the hospital will be busy.
Overnight, i stayed in a hotel. I was really tired but didn't managed to get a nice sleep.

The following day, i was at the airport by 6am and the flight to Sandakan departed at 7.10am.
Meanwhile, my nurse and the driver started their journey back to Sandakan by an ambulance.
The KK airport.
I was in Sandakan by 7.50am and i was picked up by the hospital driver back to the hospital where i continue working.

(Nota kaki: memang penat travel by road dari Sandakan ke Kota Kinabalu..Nasib baik bukan DrBond yang drive (macamla tau drive!!!). DrBond ucapkan selamat memandu kepada pemandu-pemandu dari Sandakan ke KK (vice versa)..Drive safely!!! Setiap kali bila dengar member2 nak drive pergi KK, memang risau sangat, perjalanan terlalu jauh dan bahaya).