date with the patients’ conditions.
‘We’re just waiting on his formal bloods. His kidney function is holding but his haemoglobin is falling. His last pulmonary haemorrhages didn’t help. We’re going to transfuse if it’s less than seventy.’
Maggie nodded and moved to the other side of the bed where Christopher’s mother sat, holding her heavily sedated son’s hand. The teenager was very pale. ‘How are you doing, Bree?’ she asked, placing a hand on the woman’s shoulder.
‘Okay, I guess,’ she said, looking up at Maggie. ‘I still can’t believe it, though. I know we’ve been here for quite a few days now but I just can’t wrap my head around it.’
Maggie nodded. Five days ago fourteen-year-old Christopher Thirkettle had coughed up large amounts of blood at school and collapsed. He’d been brought to the Brisbane Children’s Hospital via ambulance where his condition had deteriorated down in the accident department requiring him to be intubated and ventilated.
A battery of tests had revealed that the teenager had Goodpasture’s disease, a very rare autoimmune disorder that caused the body’s immune system to attack its own lung and kidney tissue. After months of vague flu-like symptoms, lethargy and a dry cough his deterioration had been rapid.
The kidney component of the disease hadn’t progressed at this stage and they were monitoring it very carefully, hoping to arrest its development altogether. Unfortunately, though, despite commencing steroids, his lungs were still in a bad way and he’d had several pulmonary haemorrhages in the last few days.
‘It’s perfectly normal to have feelings of disbelief when your child falls ill like this,’ Maggie assured Bree, giving her shoulder a squeeze. ‘Would you like to chat to our social worker to talk some of these feelings through? I can arrange it for you.’
‘That won’t be necessary, Sister.’
Maggie turned to find Christopher’s rather overbearing grandfather behind her. He was an odd man, often rude and abrupt, but he’d lived with Christopher and Bree since his grandson had been a baby and there was no denying how good he was with Christopher.
She took a deep, steadying breath as Bree said, ‘Dad, Maggie’s just trying to help.’
‘Well anyway,’ Maggie said, ‘just let me know if you ever require their services.’ She gave Bree’s shoulder another squeeze and moved back towards Linda, keeping one ear on the conversation between father and daughter.
‘Are the results back yet?’ he asked.
‘Not yet, Dad.’
‘I think it’s a mistake to give him a blood transfusion. We don’t know what diseases could be passed on to him.’
‘Dad, we’ve been through this,’ Bree muttered. ‘Leave it alone.’
Maggie shared a look with Linda. Bree had let them know in the beginning that her father was a control freak and a conspiracy theorist. He’d been under the care of a psychiatrist for long periods of depression since his wife, Bree’s mother, had passed away years ago from a hospital bungle.
She’d warned them that her father would find Christopher’s hospitalisation difficult. And she hadn’t been wrong. He had been quite trying, questioning the necessity for every single treatment, every blood test, every X-ray and drug.
Being allocated to Christopher’s bed was fast becoming something to avoid. Bree was great but her father was trying everyone’s patience.
Still, it was all part of the job and Maggie knew that underneath the man’s incessant badgering and tendency to interfere he was basically a concerned grandfather and a grieving husband who hadn’t worked through his issues from his wife’s death. Everyone reacted differently when their loved ones were critically ill and the PICU staff were well used to dealing with the many manifestations of grief.
‘You okay here?’ she asked Linda quietly.
Linda nodded. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll holler if I need you.’
Maggie moved to bed three to check out Toby’s progress. The nurse looking after him took advantage of Maggie’s presence and scooted to the bathroom and Maggie greeted Brett before turning her attention to Toby.
‘Hello, little man,’ she crooned, moving to the opposite side of the bed from his father. ‘Have you got a smile for me yet?’
‘Nope. Still cranky with the world, I’m afraid.’ Brett grimaced.
‘Ah, well.’ Maggie smiled at the little boy whose bottom lip was wobbling. ‘I guess he has a right to be.’
But he was improving rapidly each day. He hadn’t needed to go back on dialysis and despite being stuck for weeks with his ventilation, even that was now improving with some good progress being made with weaning.
The monotonous, worrying holding pattern had lifted as Toby’s condition turned a corner. Everyone was hoping that Alice and