“Growing up” within 8 hours …

The phone rang whilst we were leaving Senai Airport for JB city. It was about 7 pm on a Friday evening.

“Bad news. One of the cars going to the roadshow venue has just met with an accident. The driver is ok, two of the passengers suffered minor injuries but the third passenger looked bad. We don’t know her condition yet.”

That was a defining moment in my life. I felt that I started “growing up” from the moment I received that call. We were in JB for an event that would run over the weekend. Nothing had prepared me for that moment. I was the most senior ranking officer there and I had to take charge. The weight of responsibility fell heavily upon my shoulders that night. Deep inside, I was a bundle of nerves and truth be told, I was scared shitless!

One of the cars driven by the event management team crashed into an oncoming car, which was travelling at the wrong direction against the traffic. Both drivers managed to swerve in time to avoid a head on collision but the brunt of the collision was on the front passenger side of both cars. As fate would have it, the other car (who was in the wrong) had no passengers and the driver escaped with minor injuries. But our girl sitting in the front passenger seat was quite seriously injured. The two back passengers suffered minor injuries and the driver was unharmed but in shock. She repeatedly asked where she was and wanted to know if she was the driver. I worried that she suffered amnesia but was relieved when she remembered my name. I was told later that she suffered memory loss of the accident itself; which was normal according to the doctor.

From then on, it was a waiting game. It was really frustrating trying to get answers from anyone at the hospital. No one knows anything! First we couldn’t find the three injured girls. And when we found out where they were, we were not allowed to see them. We waited but my patience was wearing thin and my worry was increasing by the minute. I finally managed to get into the examination area and found two of the girls within minutes. Both were in separate waiting areas. They looked ok except for some lacerations here and there. However, both were on wheelchairs and could not walk.

The older lady was calm and looked able to handle herself, whilst the younger one was in tears when she saw me. She just needed reassurance that everything was ok and that she could continue going to her dancing classes the following week. No one was providing her any information. It was appalling the way the hospital staff kept the patients in the dark about what was going on. Either they did not know or they could not be bothered to inform them. In any case, we were finally told that they could be discharged that night. The Project Manager of the event helped with the discharge procedures and we managed to get one of the team members to stay with the younger girl whilst I continued looking for the third girl.

I finally found her lying on her back. I was told that her backbone had been injured and she had to stay the night at the hospital. By then, we suspected that she had fractured her backbone but had no idea how bad that was. She is one tough cookie! Despite her pain (and it must have been crucial then), she was very calm and rational. She just needed to know what was going on and whether she could walk again. I was clueless. By then, I realised that prying any information out of the orderlies and nurses was an exercise in futility. They must have been trained by the CIA or the FBI and was probably told that information must not be released, not even upon death threats!

It must have been all of four hours since her admission to the hospital, but finally she was wheeled to the ward. That’s the other thing I discovered about the hospital. There was absolutely no sense of urgency. I tried to speak to a doctor regarding her condition. I too needed reassurance. After hounding the nurses for more than half an hour, one trainee doctor finally made an appearance. Speaking to her required another bout of patience as she was unable to convince me that the girl’s condition was ok. I insisted I wanted to see the specialist but was told that the specialist was on call and would only come after 10pm but she could not say if it would be 11pm, midnight or the early morning.

Another bout of waiting ensued. Meanwhile my handphone was ringing “off the hook”. The head of the event management company, T, was driving down to handle this situation. That was a welcome relief. My colleague, who was overseeing the event set-up, wanted to know what was happening. My colleagues in KL were trying to provide me information on private specialist centres and give me moral support on how to handle the hospital authorities. And the worst of it all, I had worried parents on the line, trying to get reassurance from me that their daughter would be ok.

By then, I realised that there was no way I would leave the girl alone overnight in that ward. The condition was terrible and the place was eerie. It reminded me of those Chinese horror flicks. Also, the attitude of the staff left much to be desired. I spoke to T again and we both agreed that we needed to move her to the specialist centre as soon as possible. However, there were protocols to follow before we could move her as any error in judgement could very well paralyse her for life.

We needed the hospital specialist or doctor to ok her release before the specialist centre could make the transfer. But the specialist never showed up. The trainee doctor dared not sign the release form and told me to wait till morning to transfer the girl. My patience was hanging by a thread then. Luckily, T finally made an appearance a little after midnight. He had driven down all the way from KL. By then, I have been holding the fort for more than 6 hours and was really drained trying to deal with so many immovable objects. It was a relief to be able to share the burden. The girl’s sister and boyfriend had also arrived from KL then and were kept in the loop of things.

Again, we spoke to the trainee doctor and insisted that someone of knowledge and authority sign the release form. She finally found a more senior GP who seemed more knowledgeable and was willing to sign the release form. Although I would have much preferred the hospital specialist to do so, I realised that beggars can’t be choosers. Finally at about 2+am, we managed to get the girl transferred to a private specialist centre. She was immediately attended to and had her x ray taken. We waited and spoke to the specialist regarding her condition. We were told that nothing much could be done that night but that she needed surgery. Both T and I returned to the hotel at about 3+ am. I was in a much better frame of mind then.

The next two days were a piece of cake compared to the first eight hours at the hospital. It was now a matter of getting the procedures underway. My heart went out to the girl and I prayed hard for a successful surgery. She was after all in her early 20s. The specialist assured us that this was a normal surgery and the chances of success is very high. A day later, after 6 hours of surgery, we were told that it had been a success. The last I heard of her was that she was already walking. The other three girls are also thriving and I met up with two of them again. I am so glad that everything turned out well.

I have “aged” more than 10 years during this experience (figuratively speaking). This was even worse than my accident in New Zealand in which I could not walk. At least then, I had only myself to think of. Here, I had the well being of four ladies to consider and the morale of the other team members to handle. (They were looking at me for direction.)

It is a sobering thought when the weight of so many falls upon your shoulders. “Growing up is really hard to do ….,” isn’t it?