Chapter 56: When Knowledge Becomes Comfort

The Social Work department put me in touch with the 911 dispatch team that first took dad’s call, as well as the crews from Edmonton Fire Rescue and EMS who supported resuscitation efforts at the house.  I made sure to let everyone I spoke with know that I wasn’t angry with them – I just needed to understand what still seems like such an incomprehensible suite of events.  I could barely contain my composure through the phone calls and was grateful that everyone I spoke to was so kind.  Also, I was touched that the people in charge of the various shifts got back to me as quickly as they did.  One of my other fears about asking the questions out loud was that I’d never hear from anyone and then sink even further into fear and despair.

To start, I needed to know why the ambulance drove so slowly from the house to the hospital – and without the lights and sirens going.  I specifically remember the lead EMS person reminding us that while they would be using emergency protocol, we weren’t allowed to speed.  Dad and I never said anything to each other at the time, but I’m sure we both had the same thoughts when we realized that we seemed to be driving faster than they were, and we were just at the speed limit.  Did the emergency workers already know something and couldn’t tell us because they’re not doctors and therefore officially not allowed to?  And if so, why did everyone waste our time for another hour at the hospital until that awful confirmatory “I’m sorry” speech from the emergency room physician?

What I learned was quite fascinating: Ambulances will always travel to an emergency with lights and sirens, but if it’s the middle of the night and there isn’t any traffic to navigate, they don’t use lights and sirens when coming back from a call.  This made sense enough – but it didn’t explain the speed issue.  That’s when I learned that two of the firefighters from the initial response team never stopped doing CPR on mom from when they started – and this carried through the drive back to the hospital.  Apparently ambulances are a little tricky to keep patients receiving CPR stabilized so in these cases, they drive at speed, or even a little below.

Once mom arrived at the emergency room, she was still within a window of time during which it’s possible to have someone “come back.”  CPR continued, and an ultrasound of mom’s heart was taken and reviewed to try and see if that would provide any additional information or suggestions of different courses of treatment.  CPR stopped when the possible “window of hope” had passed, and medical staff concluded that there was no hope of resuscitation.  At least this lines up with what we learned at autopsy – and the sad truth is that mom was gone instantly, before dad could get on the phone to 911, before the first set of first responders arrived to their house.  But – without knowing that an aortic dissection had taken place, everyone made all efforts to try and do what they could to save mom.