“When you get a phone call like that, everything stops”. All is revealed in episode 9 of ’24 Hours in A&E’
Twenty-two-year-old motorcyclist Adam has crashed into a car and been thrown 30 metres. Rosa, who’s 18, fell off her bike after a night out with friends. Her mum is not impressed.
22-year-old motorcyclist Adam is brought to A&E after crashing into a car and being thrown thirty metres. Adam has injured his neck and spine and doctors are concerned that the severity of his leg injuries mean that he risks losing his foot.
“At the speeds the motorcyclists are going the bones in your lower leg can break reasonably easily,” says consultant Neel. “If the bone breaks and tears one of the blood vessels and it’s not treated immediately your foot can go blue and that can cause the foot to die.”
Adam’s mum Diane was phoned at home by the police. “When you get a phone call like that, everything stops. I don’t remember anything else, apart from listening to the police officer say ‘He’s going to St George’s, we’re still at the scene’,” she says. “And the adrenaline kicks in ‘I need to get to the hospital, I need to see my son’.”
The medical team send Adam for a full body CT scan to find out how bad things are.
Meanwhile 78-year-old former nurse Lina has been brought to St George’s by her husband Tony after becoming dizzy at her sewing class. Tony talks about how the couple met and their life together before Lina takes a turn for the worse and doctors worry she has had a stroke.
Lina had a stroke two years ago and Tony had to become her carer. “It was just the course of things that happen, I never thought about it. It’s something she’d do for me and I’d do for her, it’s as simple as that,” says Tony. “Just little things you wouldn’t have done before – or she wouldn’t have let me do before.”
And 18-year-old Rosa is in minors with her mum Jo having fallen off her bike on the way home after a night out with friends. Jo is not impressed. “You smell like the floor of an old pub. Let’s not talk about it, I’m still cross,” she tells Rosa.
“I think a lot of my generation suffers from FOMO – Fear Of Missing Out – I get that big time,” says Rosa. “I always think of it like there’s another version of me that is tomorrow morning that has to deal with it, but right now I’m not that version of me so it’s alright.”
