I see the queue going out of the A&E door. A quiet August indeed... Labour MP and doctor Rosena Allin-Khan on her frontline NHS job
Some people are in pain, some in tears and some just want to be reassured. Simultaneously I am calming a dental nurse in her 40s who has received a needle stick injury from an HIV-positive patient, dealing with an axious young mum searching for Paediatrics for her baby and administering fluids and antibiotics to a very weak 72-year-old man. I really need a cup of tea.
The patient board is full. It is standing room only but still more and more ambulances are arriving.
Noise erupts as a red-faced, bruised man wanders in slurring. He manages to say he really wants to give up drinking – but then leaves before I can get help.
I have tea in a polystyrene cup. Only full-fat milk and two sugars will do.
A colleague sits down and sighs. She has just watched a wife and mother in her 50s, who called an ambulance feeling dizzy and unwell, deteriorate terribly. She is unlikely to survive.
I see her family arriving and my stomach is in knots. So often in this job, the news you have to tell families changes their lives forever.
I walk a white-haired man in his 90s with dementia back from X-ray to his cubicle. We chat about the war, though his family say he won’t recall the conversation. Back in majors there is a constant hum of noise, broken by the occasional cry of pain. Police are escorting a man in handcuffs and I see the young mum from earlier, her baby now wearing an “I’m a brave boy” sticker.
Heading home. I relish the opportunities I get to serve my community – campaigning to improve lives as an MP and saving lives as a Trauma and Emergency doctor. And I’m proud of both.