Joan was looking at the forms in front of her; everything was still blurry, and she had no idea where she was. All she remembered was that she had been walking somewhere. But where was she going? Something wasn't right; something felt off. Was she wearing clothes? Joan felt unusually exposed and finally looked around to take in her surroundings. Her eyes were barely coming into focus, as if she had been in a dark room for months and was finally being brought into the light. The forms that had been placed in front of her gave her a bit of a shock, as the whiteness of the paper was surprisingly blinding.
"I need you to confirm that you are indeed Joan Arthy. Can you see the information in this document?" An executive stood at the side of Joan's bed, wearing a white button-up shirt and nice black slacks. The gentleman seemed determined to make Joan read the document, regardless of whether she was capable.
“You need to get out! NOW!” A handsome doctor burst into her room, shoving the door with such force that even the air brake made no difference as the door flew open and slammed against the wall. “My patient is not ready and is in no way capable of reading your document, not to mention comprehending it. She has just experienced major trauma, and you will treat her as such. And until I deem her fit, you will not come back. Now leave! LEAVE!” The doctors’ yell reverberated through Joan, forcing her eyes to come further into focus. He remained standing at the door, pointing toward the exit and staring down the executive with such ferocity that Joan would remember it as one of the scariest sights she had ever seen.
The executive stood there defiantly for only a moment, obviously trying to find the words he wanted to say to the doctor. Finally, with narrowed eyes, he walked out, huffing as he passed. The doctor remained as vigilant as a bulldog, staring the executive down until he turned the corner into another hallway.
"Thank you, Sara," the doctor said, clearly trying to calm down from the frustrating situation he had just encountered.
"No problem, Doctor," the nurse said as she walked into the room and closed the door.
The doctor walked over to Joan and sat on a rolling stool next to her, looking into her face with the most concentrated expression she had ever seen. “Ok, follow my hand with your head.” He moved his hand back and forth, up and down. Joan followed with her head as best she could, struggling with the motion.
After a little while of silently staring, he stood up and walked over to a stack of glove boxes hanging next to the doorway. He pulled on the gloves and took out a Retinoscope, then sat back down next to Joan.
"Joan, isn't it? I understand you are just waking up, and things might be confusing. I don't need you to talk right now, but Nurse Sara and I will take your vitals. We don't want you to be frightened, but we will need to draw some blood, as well as inspect your ears, eyes, and mouth." The doctor said all this while staring directly at Joan with what she would now call gentle eyes, a completely different look from the man who had just chased the executive from her room.
The nurse approached the board and began writing some basic information. "Michael" next to "Doctor" and "Sara" next to "Nurse,” then she wrote the date 05/22/2091 in the top right-hand corner.
Joan tried to say something, but only a moan escaped her lips. She didn't know what was wrong; she knew she wanted to say something, but the words just wouldn't come out. Nervously, Sara walked over, placed her hand on Joan's arm, and leaned in front of her, moving much like the doctor did when he first sat down to examine Joan.
"If you are trying to talk and are having a hard time, don't worry. Hopefully, your voice will return to you quickly. By the end of the day, we can hopefully get you saying some full words, but for now, don't worry if things don't come out the way you want. Just try to say what you can." The nurse had the same loving demeanor as the doctor. Joan felt comfort wash over her as she listened to the nurse; it combated the fear rising in Joan as she realized that everything her body was supposed to do was failing. From moving her arms to tilting her head, nothing worked.
The doctor turned on the retinoscope, first shining it directly to see how her pupils were reacting. "No scarring at the back of the eye; the blood vessels look inflamed. She may be having a hard time seeing anything in the distance for a while. Her pupils have a delayed response to stimuli, but they dilate and constrict as they should. Make a note that the delayed response may be an effect of any medication administered by first responders.”
“Joan, could you open your mouth for me, please?” he placed a tough depressor into her mouth to hold the tongue down. Joan couldn't help but make a noise as she opened her mouth; she still wanted to say something, but only grunts and moans came out. The doctor bent down and shone a light into her mouth, looking at the back of her throat. "There is definite scarring at the back of her throat. Make a note: this scarring looks like someone pushed in a breathing tube. Did she have to be intubated on the way here?"
The nurse stopped typing and started scrolling on her screen. "No, it does not look like it, but I have never seen such bad paperwork in my entire career." The nurse had a strange look of confused concentration on her face as she was obviously trying to read as fast as she could. "I don't know how to explain it, but I am missing an entire chunk of her medical report." The doctor looked over at the nurse with a baffled expression. "What do you mean you're missing an entire chunk?" The nurse shook her head in disbelief at what she was seeing.
"I don't know what to tell you, doctor, but there is no communication from the accident to the hospital. I have a record of the accident: a young woman, age 19, was supposedly walking down a street when a car pulled out and hit her.” The nurse paused for a moment as she continued reading.
"The patient was hit and launched by the car, and she was found just a few feet away from the accident in the state she is in now. There is no record of what the medical team did at the scene or in transit. In fact, it basically states that they examined her, deemed her fit, placed her in the ambulance, and brought her to the ER, but there is nothing about the trip between the accident and here. How did they even know who she was?"
The nurse was becoming increasingly irritated. "I don't know what you want to do, but I have an incomplete chart here, and the information I have been given is minimal. If we go by what I have in this report, we might as well be starting from the beginning. I can't even find their results for a concussion; all it says here is that she has one. That's all."
The doctor took one more look at Joan and, with some of the irritation that Joan had seen earlier, took off his gloves and threw them in the trash. "Start from the beginning. Retest her for everything. I'm going to make a couple of phone calls and see what’s going on." The doctor then turned and walked towards the door, giving the screen a quick read right before he left. "I'll look at this in my office. Start her on all those tests; I want to know what they're not telling us."
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