Seizure

For me, the worst time to get a call is around 0500.

The tones went off just after 5 in the morning. As I headed toward the engine I glanced at my watch. My heart sank a little as I realized that I was up for the day.

We headed to an apartment complex just a half block down from the station. The city streets were empty this early on a Sunday morning. When we arrived at the front door we found it open. I called out "fire department" and heard someone yell that they were upstairs.

On the second floor of the two bedroom apartment things were a little crowded. There were two families living here. My patient was on the floor in the kids room between the full size bed and the bunk bed.

Two of the kids awoke when they heard the 10 year old thrashing about. They woke mom up who then woke a dispatcher up (ok, she probably wasn't totally asleep) who in turn woke us up.

By the time that I knelt at his side my patient had stopped seizing. One of the older kids said that he shook for about 2 minutes (which means it was actually about 30 seconds). My patient had no injuries or oral trauma from the seizure. He wasn't feverish, and, per the mother, had no history of seizures, didn't use drugs and hasn't had a head injury recently.

We placed him on some oxygen to help bring him out of his postictal state and then check his sugar. By the time AMR arrived he was opening his eyes and looking around in confusion. After a couple of minutes he was able to walk down the stairs.

Finally we head back to the station to start the morning routine: pot of coffee on, grab the paper, check staffing to see who is coming in this morning, take a shower and grab breakfast. Once all that is done we hand over the reins to the next crew.

Time to go home.