Ayooo (some) Healthcare Boys are back! :D
(@hermitdrabbles56 @squigglywindy)
The emergency department was busy.
Very busy.
It wasn't even the usual kind of busy, the hustle and bustle of residents falling behind on paperwork and orders, leading to a backup in the line for mild to moderately sick patients. It wasn't half the city's population using the ED as their primary care because they either didn't have the time, patience, money, or opportunity to get an actual primary care provider.
No, these patients were sick. They were actually having emergencies, and there were a lot of them.
Legend and Warriors were each caring for the sickest in the department. Both patients desperately needed ICU beds, and they knew they were in short supply. Warriors, keen on listening to the charge nurse and hospitalist's words about the status of beds and patient acuity, had already figured out that there was one remaining ICU bed in the entire hospital. A neighboring hospital also only had one bed available, and was willing to accept a patient.
That meant they had to decide who to fly and who to keep. That decision was already a difficult one, left to the emergency physician who was trying to parse it out, but the biggest dilemma wasn't even that.
It was the blasted hospitalist.
Warriors had mostly dealt with emergency personnel in the war. Most of his experience was in a field hospital, which had little beyond immediate, urgent care before shipping a patient to an actual hospital for continued treatment. It wasn't until the waning years of the war that he'd transferred off the front lines entirely.
In that time, he'd learned that he didn't like hospitalists. They were the physicians who took care of acutely ill and injured patients who were being hospitalized, the ones who would usually be on the floor. They also were the buffer between the ER and the rest of the floors - even an ICU patient had to go through their screening, alongside a critical care consultation with physicians trained in whatever specialty was needed. Hospitalists often had to juggle far more patients than was likely safe, which stretched them thin and burned them out. He'd heard there were good ones in Hyrule Hospital, but he'd yet to meet them.
This one definitely did not fall into the criteria of a good one.
"We need to figure out who to fly," the emergency physician remarked.
The hospital crossed his arms. "Whoever doesn't die first, I suppose."
Warriors froze midway through charting something, having been basically living in the patient's room as they were too ill for him to leave. He saw Legend, who was walking swiftly out of his own room to grab supplies, also screech to a halt.
The emergency physician glanced at the hospitalist and cut through his remark. "Let's just assume they both survive the night. We still need to figure this out."
"I think we should just board both of them here," the hospitalist remarked.
Board them? In the emergency department? Was he insane? The ER was not designed to house patients with intensive care needs. The ER stabilized people, fixed immediate issues, and then moved them to where they needed to go, whether it was a follow up with primary care, a bed in the acute care floors, to the operating room, or a straight shot up to an ICU room. ED nurses could have up to four patients - they didn't have the staffing to dedicate a nurse to just a single patient, as these two clearly needed the extra care and undivided attention. The hospitalist was suggesting they stay?
Legend whirled on the pair of physicians. "Absolutely not. These two patients need an ICU. That's inappropriate care."
"We have no beds," the hospitalist argued.
"We have one bed," Warriors fired back. "And the other hospital has one as well."
"Our ICU nurses can't handle this kind of patient," the hospitalist retorted.
Legend huffed. "Then they're not actual ICU nurses."
The emergency physician piped up, emboldened by the nurses. "They're right. These patients are absolutely not staying here."
The hospitalist's face grew sour, and he started to shuffle towards a computer elsewhere to look more thoroughly at the patients' charts again.
The emergency physician glanced at the pair. "Thank you."
Warriors and Legend both nodded, watching the doctor follow his peer to ensure he actually worked this out. The two nurses looked at each other next, just for a moment, a silent respect settling between them, before they went back to work.
XXX
Hyrule stared at the dispatch information. "Does... does this say entrapment at the Salvation Army?"
"How...?" Mo started to ask, just as confused. "What...?"
Dot laughed outright. "Oh my gosh, wait - look at the age. That's got to be Beedle."
Hyrule groaned. How in the world had Beedle gotten himself entrapped somewhere around the Salvation Army?
The pair quickly found out as they arrived with the fire department. Beedle had situated himself in the donation booth, smiling pleasantly as they arrived.
"Beedle," Hyrule immediately said, hands on his hips. "What in the world are you doing?"
"I saw some shady looking guy walking into the store," Beedle explained. "I wanted to make sure he didn't burn the place down! So I hid in here."
"How are you stuck?" Mo asked.
"I can't get out!" Beedle gestured around himself.
"Well how did you get in?"
Beedle pointed behind him. "There's a door here."
Mo and Hyrule looked at each other. Then the firefighters.
One of their coworkers chewed his lip, half exasperated and half amused. "So uh... did you try the door, then?"
Beedle blinked and turned around, jiggling at the latch a little before the door opened. "Oh! Thank you!"
"Oh my heaven," Mo muttered, face in his hands.
A police officer then approached. "Sir, the store manager is also citing you for trespassing."
Beedle jumped, clearly affronted. "Trespassing? I was protecting them!" With a huff, he added, "That's it! The next time a shady person walks by I'm just going to let them burn the store."
Hyrule had to cough to hide his laugh.
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