As we toured the ruins, a rock gave way and my brother fell about 4 ft. He knew immediately he had broken his arm. We loaded everyone up and head into the city of Antalya with no clue how to get to the hospital. I had seen a sign that said "Memorial Hospital" and made the assumption it might be a private hospital and our best hope for an English-speaking doctor. CC called the number on it as he drove. They re-directed his call to Istanbul.
Someone there told him to just drive to the center of the city, on the main street, and he would find the main hospital. And so we drove. We passed several small clinics, but just felt this needed a big hospital. It was very swollen and painful at this point and visibly broken. At one point, CC said he was just praying God would show him where to go, when he felt he needed to turn off. He said that he felt maybe to continue straight might take him out of the big city. With that, the Lord put us on the right road. He drove for awhile, then stopped to ask a man on the street, who told him to take the next right. Truly, there was the hospital.
We realized after arriving that it was not a private hospital, but a public one. I've never been in hospital chaos like we were that day. Immediately, we were provided a liason who spoke English. She was very dear and made the entire experience so much better for us. We rode an elevator crammed with 15 people, trying to form a sort of gate around my brother so no one would bump his arm. We went to get x-rays. The halls were filled with people trying to get in to multiple little rooms for x rays. They bumped us up to emergency status, and our friend got us in.
We went back down the crowded elevator to the ER, where they called in an orthopedic doctor. When he arrived, the liason mistakenly said, "We are waiting for the doctor." That seemed to irritate him. At that point, what little bedside manner he had was gone. He set Tim's arm without anesthesia. I won't describe it here, but I'll just say that I rarely have days where I really don't want to be here, but that day was one of them. They put a cast on it, the old kind like you'd see when we were kids.
Thankfully, Tim has since seen his doctor in the US who said everything was done (almost) perfectly. It's interesting to me how much a person can bless you or make you miserable in a crisis situation. The liason was comforting to us, stayed with us the entire time, reassured us. She made the whole situation easier. But the ER doctor made a horrible situation even worse. I'm past my initial feelings toward him enough to step back and learn something from it. I want to bless others when they are suffering.
And all the credit for the day goes to the Lord who got us to the right place when we really had no clue where to go. Isn't that true about pretty much everything we do?
1 comment:
Hubs is flying tonight and not reading about the plane and procedures and what not, so I can finally comment on the computer and not my phone!! Ok, since I've lived in that part of the world, I can picture the scene and wow- so sorry for the lack of bedside manner!! Yikes! God is so good!!
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