How’s your foot, asks the doc. Still on me leg, says Minnie, 98!
WiTH its trademark shameless sentimentality, 24 Hours In A&E
(C4) returned to show us the life-anddeath medical dramas that were unfolding on the day of Harry and Meghan’s wedding in May last year.
inevitably, the stories that emerged were all about patients in long, loving relationships. You almost wonder whether the producers keep a warehouse full of suitable victims, ready to injure them as the narrative demands.
John was 92 and had taken a very unfortunate nosedive off his stairlift. He and his wife of 66 years, Maggie, had been watching the telly coverage from Windsor moments earlier and reminiscing about their own wedding in 1952.
‘ We had canapes,’ declared Maggie proudly, ‘which we’d never even heard of back then.’
On the front desk at St George’s Hospital, South-West london, the receptionists were glued to the radio, taking bets on the colour of the Queen’s hat and who the celebrity guests would be. The cameras shot rapid glances around the wards, eavesdropping on patients in the waiting room and fretful relatives keeping vigil at bedsides.
in contrast to the sensation of boredom that pervades most hospitals, there’s a constant
implication here that intense excitement is about to erupt.
it arrived with an air ambulance and a ‘code-red’ alert, as a 74-yearold man was brought in suffering from multiple fractures. He had fallen off a ladder onto concrete while cleaning the upstairs windows and smashed his pelvis.
The severity of david’s injuries was confirmed when the consultant studied the CT scan and said: ‘Oooh . . . that’s nasty!’ Not what any patient wants to hear.
in a nearby ward, 98-year- old Minnie was cheeking the doctors. One shiny- faced junior medic asked her loudly and patronisingly how her poorly foot was. ‘ Still attached to me leg,’ answered Minnie briskly. Attagirl! if they don’t show respect, box their ears.
Each story kept unfolding. We learned about the years Minnie had devoted to looking after her son, who had cerebral palsy.
Maggie gradually became her husband’s carer, as his dementia worsened. ‘in many ways he’s been too good for me,’ she insisted.
Window cleaner david spent three months in hospital — time that helped his partner of 30 years, lynda, to realise how much she’d miss him if he were gone. When he finally returned home, the couple started discussing their wedding plans. i hope they have canapes.
Surgeons: At The Edge Of Life (BBC2) is also shot on the wards and the operating theatres, this time at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, but the patients and their life stories are secondary. This show concentrates on the surgical procedures, which can be brutal.
‘There’s a few organs we could injure,’ remarked one doctor blithely, ‘ that could kill the patient on the table.’ Some of his instruments looked more like gardening tools than scalpels. One op started with a keyhole incision; several hours later the poor woman looked like a diagram in a medical manual.
‘This is a very hostile chest,’ complained the surgeon, as his patient’s left lung resisted removal. He intended to put it back, but not before he’d whipped out her oesophagus and replaced it by connecting her intestines straight to her throat. ‘Now the stomach is placed in a plastic bag,’ he informed us.
What always bewilders me is how the human body can recover from such a comprehensive dissection. The surgery is wonderful, but it’s the healing process that’s truly miraculous.
STUNNING CAST OF THE NIGHT: From the quietly shocking first scene, every role in Chernobyl (Sky Atlantic) was played by an outstanding actor — Jared Harris, Robert Emms, Jessie Buckley, Con O’Neill and many more. Superlative drama.