Hope you like this chapter. I stayed up until 3 writing it. Forgive any misspellings or misuses of medical jargon. I am not a doctor, so don't know if I used it right. Please rate, review, and keep giving me your opinion on the names. I really appreciate it
Owen was terrified.
Sure he had been in more dangerous positions. He was in Baghdad during wartime. He had been in explosions, firefights, dust storms, and floods. That made him nervous. Seeing a twelve year old girl mangled, bleeding, and on the verge of death, that left him terrified.
All the doctors just stood there, unsure of what do first. If they moved her the wrong way, she could bleed out and die. If they don't move her at all, she would still bleed out and die. They all looked at Owen, obviously thinking 'You're the trauma guy. What do we do?" But, honestly, Owen had no idea what to do. No idea at all.
He had to think of something to do, quick. This girl was falling, and falling fast.
"Alright." Hunt breathed. "Well, an MRI is obviously out, given our lack of time and the metal in her chest. Let's get an x-Ray in here to determine our course of action." They all stared at him. "Stat!" He yelled.
Mark ran out of the room. He returned about 30 seconds later with the portable x-Ray.
"Position it over her abdomen. Let's see the damage her femur did. Then, move it there her chest, then her brain. We'll get the pictures, and go from there." His fellow doctors nodded. Owen strapped on a protective vest while the rest left the room. He positioned the x-Ray as quickly as possible; the girl's BP was dropping fast.
"Alright. All clear." He hollered at the awaiting doctors. "Let's see those images. Meredith, run, do not walk, to radiology. Get those images. I don't care who you have to step on. Get them fast." Meredith took off at a sprint. "In the meantime, Derek, get some gauze for that head wound. Try and stop the bleeding. Torres, start an IV."
Derek raided the cabinets of the trauma room, grabbing as much gauze as possible. He pressed it to the gaping head wound, blood still pouring out of it. Callie grabbed an IV kit, and inserted the needle in her arm, her hands trembling. Bailey began to feel around the abdomen.
"Even without the pictures, I can tell she has severe internal injuries. Tenderness over McBurney's point. She's going to need an appendectomy. These shards have probably impaled her spleen, liver, kidney, maybe even more. It will be a miracle if she makes it through the next hour." Bailey continued pressing her stomach.
"Her legs are broken. I'll be surprised if she gets to keep the left leg." Torres gestured to the leg that was impaling her chest. "We'll have to pop that shoulder back to."
Mark looked at the girl's face. She had deep purple bruises around her eyes. Her nose was broken and swollen. Their were third degree burns on her cheek. Why was she burned? There could only be one explanation."Was there any fire at the crash sight?"
"Um, yeah." Callie remembered. "Lisa said that when the vehicles collided, it created a small fire. They took care of it quickly." That explained a lot. "Why?" She walked up to the girl's face.
"Well, Jane Doe here has several third degree burns on her neck and face. We'll need a skin graft. There may be more burns on the rest of her body."
"Yes she does." Bailey had rolled up the girl's shirt to examine further, and there were several burns all across her chest.
Meredith ran back into the ER, her hands full of pictures. She placed them against the light. What they saw made each of them even more terrified.
Crap. Owen thought.
"Her femur is impaling her abdomen, and it lodged itself in the top of her stomach. See," Owen pointed to the picture. "There's a lot of free fluid around there. Most of the shards missed her vital organs, except for this one, and this one." He pointed to the metal and glass shards that had pierced her liver and her right kidney. "We'll need to get in there right away." Hunt switched the X-rays.
"Oh God." Teddy whispered. "That metal shard is lodged right next to her aorta. It missed it by a hair. If that piece moves even a fraction, she'll bleed out in seconds. She has a few cracked ribs, from being crushed, and look there." She pointed at her rib cage. "This rib there is completely broken off from the rest of them."
"Let's see the head scans." Derek proceeded to once again change the images. Of course the brain guy wanted to see head scans. It's the reason he wakes up in the morning. All the doctors looked at the new scans.
And they had thought that the abdomen scans were bad.
"The hole above her ear is bleeding like crazy, but none of the tissue was punctured. Actually, it's kind of a good thing that the hole is there." What? Owen thought. How the heck is a hole in your skull a good thing? Derek must have sensed his confusion, because he continued with his analysis. "Look here." He said, pointing at the top of her skull. "Her skull has hit by a blunt object, and was dented. Severely dented. That caused her brain to start swelling. The hole provided some room for the brain to swell into, but if we don't relieve the pressure soon, she will hemorrhage and die." Derek finished his summary. He ran his hand through his hair and leaned against the file cabinet. The only sound in the room was they fast beeping of Jane Doe's heart rate monitor.
No matter what they did, there was a risk of her bleeding out and dying. What were they going to do?
"I have an idea." Meredith squeaked quietly, as if unsure of herself. But, seeing as no one else had any ideas, she went through with it. "What if we pull the femur out and straighten the leg? Then we could take her down to the OR. Derek will have to remove the top of her skull, to let her brain swell. While he does that, Hunt and Bailey could fix the problems in her stomach, and Teddy could remove the shard of metal from her chest. Torres could work on setting the bones. If, by some miracle, this girl lives, Mark can do the skin grafts after we are done."
That's a good idea! Owen thought.
"Alright let's do that. Grey go call the OR. Tell them we are coming down. The rest of us are going to set her leg back in place." Owen took charge, delegating jobs to his coworkers,
"Ok. Everyone grab hold of the leg. Mark, hold the girl in place. Now on my count,we are all going to pull the leg out, and lay it flat. Ready?" Torres looked around at her grimacing coworkers. Obviously they didn't like bones as much as she did. "One, two, three!" There was a nasty popping sound as they pulled the leg into place. Gently they placed her leg on the bed. It was still facing the wrong direction, but at least it wasn't stabbing her in the stomach.
"Grey, are they ready for us?" Owen looked over. Meredith nodded back at him. "Then let's go." Each doctor grabbed a side of the rolling bed, and started running.
The group began running down the hallway, towards the elevator. No one cared if people were in their way, they just pushed them aside. Several other doctors stopped and gawked at the sight of the mangled Jane Doe. One nurse literally knocked over a shelf in shock.
When they hit the elevator, it was full of people.
"Everybody out! Now!" Owen yelled, his voice rough and on edge. The elevator people did not need to be told twice. They pushed past each other, trying to get out of the way of the bed. The doctors clamored in and shifted anxiously the entire ride. When the elevator finally dinged and the doors opened, they practically sprinted out, almost knocking over Lexie, who was waiting for the elevator just outside. She looked like she was about to say something, but as soon as she saw Jane Doe, she shut her mouth.
"Which OR Mer?" Derek asked wildly.
"2!"
The pushed the bed through the hall, and into OR 2. There was already a staff of nurses on the OR, all of them scrubbed in and ready to go.
"What the hell happened to her?!" One of the scrub nurses looked as if she wants ready to gag. "How does someone get that messed up?"
"Hey." Mark yelled, startling the nurse. "This girl saved one of our doctor's lives. Show a little respect." That shut the nurse right up. "She was hit by a semi. Burst appendix, stabbed in the kidney and liver, a shard of metal next to her aorta. A severe brain bleed and swelling. Shattered femur and two broken fibias. And that's just the tip of the iceberg."
They transferred her carefully onto the operating table, making sure they didn't move any of the metal shards. They placed a piece of foam under her neck to prop her head up. The team began to drape Jane Doe's body. The hoard of doctors ran into the scrub room, and began to scrub in as quickly as possible.
"Do you think she's going to live?" Teddy whispered to Owen. He looked at and their eyes met. She was scared. Her eyes were welling with tears.
"I... I don't know." Owen responded. He wanted to do something. He wanted to hug Teddy. He wanted to help her, but he couldn't. Owen chose Cristina.
He chose Cristina. Teddy knew that.
Teddy seemed to pick up on this awkward moment, because she quickly looked away and finished scrubbing. Meredith and Derek pulled on their gloves and made their way to her head. Bailey quickly made her way to the girl's abdomen, careful to stand on the opposite side of the anesthesiologist, and her ex-boyfriend, Ben Warren. Owen took his place across from Bailey. Teddy stood next to him, their shoulders touching. Callie and Mark stood by her legs, ready to set the bones.
"Warren, is she out?" Owen turned to the anesthesiologist
"Yeah, she's out." He nodded.
"Then let's get going. If any of you are religious, say a prayer right now. We're going to need it." Owen looked at his team, all of them ready to start. "It's now or never. Boki, scalpel."