Life support has been withdrawn from Alfie Evans

Picture this: If you were one of them, and there were two patients waiting to be seen; one of them (let's call him or her A) is looking worried and had been triaged with symptoms including chest pains and shortness of breath, and the other one (whom we'll call B?) smelled strongly of alcohol, was scarcely coherent, was puking up all over the place, had just clobbered one of the nurses, and had an unsteady gait, to which of them would you be inclined to deploy your skills first, A or B? Think carefully now . . .

 

Y'see, here's what you don't understand: those who purposefully get out of their minds on substances need not have put themselves into such a position as to take precedence over someone who might be at deaths door through no fault of their own?? I'll exemplify it for you this way . . . do you not think it would be an irony if you or one of your family were afflicted with a life-threatening health episode, and just as they're going to fix you/your family member up in intensive care, some drunk turns up and you're/they're suddenly abandoned. It would be even more ironic if that drunk then punched the emergency doctors lights out? Why is it that I need to give an obvious exemplar in order to make someone recognize such a glaring flaw in their simplistic rationale.

 

A would have been sent straight to majors and the police would have been called for B

 

It's not the job of people treating patients to make moral judgments.
Moreover, the situation you've invented is impossible in real life.
Patients being treated in a IT unit are not able to run around causing mayhem.

 

Majors?

 

I would be more INCLINED to treat A first and I wouldn't WANT to treat B AT ALL never mind treat them second! This would obviously be the case with medical staff too. However, the rules say that they must treat first the one whose life is more at risk. And in your scenario, its impossible for me to know which one is in the more life threatening condition. Who would you say is in the more life threatening condition? And is A's condition the same as your sister's condition on that day?

 

I don't want to talk about that any more - I got quite upset yesterday. (and it was in the middle of the night when she was in extremis).

 

Fair enough. But unfortunately the medical system is based on preserving life wherever it needs preserving and in emergency situations, priority must be decided based on who's life is being threatened the most - it is NOT based on how they ended up with their condition.

 

If someone obviously doesn't care about their health then why should you care about it? I honestly don't understand that.

 

Again, how can it be known with 100% certainty that someone is in the condition that they are in because of something stupid that they did?

 

Major trauma and/or Major assessment.

No need to ask Cerberus about his sister, just ask me about my experiences.
Emergency visits to the home are available 24/7.

My mum had a syringe driver as the pain got worse, but we didn't once have to call out the nurse to top it up, thankfully.
I couldn't imagine being told to take her to A&E . Its beyond my understanding how anyone with enough pain to need morphine injections being told to go to A&E in the first place, let alone have to wait around in the general waiting room for the walking wounded.

 

Do you know for certain that someone who had been triaged with symptoms including chest pains and shortness of breath would be "sent straight to majors?"

 

If someone has alcohol fumes on their breath they've obviously been drinking it? But I still don't know why you should care about them if they don't care for themselves?

 

Ironic given the simplistic attempts at trying to rationalize the irrational.

How does the person in charge in triage know the difference between someone who was in a bar fight and is now bleeding out and someone who was just walking home from the pub and was knocked down by a vehicle and is bleeding out? Both smell of alcohol and both have serious life threatening injuries.

The purpose of triage is to prioritize based upon who is in the greatest need of immediate medical care.

Pain medications are not a priority when there are life threatening injuries that come first.

No amount of hissyfit footstomping is going to change how triage operates in the real world.

 

How do you know that they weren't at a wedding celebrating the marriage of loved ones?

 

I can't be bothered to keep arguing with you: although the example I gave was hypothetical, I actually hope it will happen to you, because only then will you understand.

 

If they overindulged then it was their choice to do so whatever the effing occasion! Jesus christ!!

 

You ever heard of girls getting their drinks spiked?

They DON'T have to care about their patients, but they'd don't NEED to care in order to do their job which is preserve life. If a doctor is getting abused by their patient, I think its safe to say that they won't have much care for them.

 

Been there and done that from both sides.

Too bad you only see it from ONE SIDE!

 

IT Unit?

 

Well if you really have then I don't understand your rationale nor ever will. Have a good day.

 

A one in a thousand event and a non sequitur anyway.

I mean why you as an individual should care, not a doctor.[/QUOTE]

 

That you don't understand is glaringly apparent.

Count the number of posts supporting your inane position regarding triage in this thread that were not made by you.

Right now that number stands at zero!

 

Sure, but do you not think that it would be a problem for that one in a thousand to be left to die just because they are assumed to have gotten drunk voluntarily? If your policy was adopted and drunk people are all assumed to have gotten drunk voluntarily and therefore should be given lower priority than others, over the years that would kill alot of innocent girls.

Oh, I wouldn't care at all!

 

Yes. No doubt about it. Those things are symptoms of a heart attack.

An ITU is an Intensive Treatment Unit. Alfie was in an ITU for children.