"I am Dr. Li, and I have news of young Mr. Scott's condition..."
Chapter 11
Nathan, Haley, Brooke, Peyton, and Karen stared expectantly at the petite man before them. For a moment, he stared back, observing the five of them. At last, he spoke.
"I am sorry that you have had to wait so long, but I was with Lucas in surgery, and I thought it would be best if I came out to give you the news myself," Dr. Li said. "As you know, he lost a lot of blood. In truth, that was our main concern—that he would go into shock. But he received several units of blood, and his blood pressure is now essentially stable. Obviously, the fact that he had stopped breathing posed another major concern. Since he was intubated prior to arriving here, but was still not breathing on his own, we decided to place him on a ventilator until such a time as he regains his own respiratory functions. This means, essentially, that a machine is performing Lucas's breathing for him. As scary as it sounds, it is almost certainly not a permanent fixture. The paramedics tell me that they had him intubated very quickly after he stopped breathing, so we can assume that his brain was not without oxygen for very long. This is a very good thing, increasing the chances that he will have minimal damage. Unfortunately, any shortage of oxygen to the brain can have negative effects, and there is no quantitative scale by which to measure them. I'm afraid we will have to wait and see how he is when he wakes up."
"When will that be?" Karen asked, as Dr. Li paused.
"As I said, there is no way to know for sure. It could be days, or it could be hours. At the moment, he is still under anesthesia from surgery. We were able to remove the tip of the arrow, which did surprisingly minimal damage. There was a small perforation in the bowel, which we repaired, but no other apparent damage. So that, at least, is a positive thing. In any case, we will know more in a day or so," Dr. Li said.
"Can we see him?" Brooke asked, teary-eyed.
"The short answer would be no; currently, he is in recovery from surgery. But you can probably see him in a few hours. He's going to be taken up to ICU though, so there are restrictions on the number of visitors and how long they may stay. I am not the expert on those regulations, however," Dr. Li said. "I suggest you discuss them with Nurse Hamlin, up at the fourth floor desk. She will let you know when you may visit Lucas. Now, if you will excuse me, I must be going about my rounds."
"Oh of course," Karen said. "Thank you, doctor." She shook Dr. Li's hand. The others repeated the gesture, before Dr. Li walked off down the hall. They looked at each other for a moment, and then headed toward the elevators and the fourth floor desk.