Parthemores in Poland

… for managing to accomplish what growing up on a farm, four years of high school football, three years of wrestling, West Point, rock climbing, Airborne and Air Assault school, and nine years in the Army (including Iraq and Afghanistan) could not:  putting Eric in a cast, all the way from wrist to shoulder nonetheless.

I should start at the beginning.  Eric has been doing some mountain biking lately, especially in the park near our house, which has a lot of good trails.  Of course I would ask him “did you take it off any sweet jumps?”

My question was slightly different Wednesday:  “Why is there dirt on your back and why are you bleeding?” 

Hmm….turns out one of those jumps wasn’t so sweet.

After Eric’s answer, “I think I separated my shoulder” we decided that he should probably go to the emergency room.  Luckily, it is only a 15 minute walk from our apartment.  After cleaning Eric up a bit (first aid tip: cheap vodka works great for cleaning out cuts and scrapes!) we were on our way. 

I was expecting a huge line of people, but we were the only ones there.  Someone saw him immediately and, thankfully, the nurse realized that our Polish wasn’t so great and used simple questions like “does it hurt here?”

They took two sets of X-rays and eventually a doctor proclaimed that the X-rays were inconclusive and a “computer examination” was needed tomorrow.  Our first questions were, where and when?  What we failed to understand, until he clarified, was that Eric had to stay overnight.

Oh….OK?

The orderly gave Eric some stylish blue pajamas and took him to a room upstairs which had a sign that said “sick room.”  I ran home to grab a few things and a small dinner for Eric and came back waaaaaay past visiting hours to find Eric and his hospital roommate watching a soccer game. 

Eventually I made it home, e-mailed our instructors, and went to bed.  I woke up four hours later to thunder, lightning, and a hyperventilating, drooling dog standing over my pillow.  In addition to fireworks, Daisy is scared of thunder.  Great. 

I would have skipped class the next day, but we had an important presentation.  (This is a whole ‘nother blog post...)  I was sure that Eric would have been released before I could get back to the hospital.  Turns out, I was quite mistaken.

I returned to the hospital at 10 am.  He already had his “computer exam” (which turned out to be a CAT scan) and was waiting for the results. 

“Waiting” was the keyword for the next several hours. 

Bottom line:  He broke his radius near the elbow and needed a cast from wrist to shoulder.  The doctor explained all of this to us in Polish.  We understood most of it, but a few parts left us confused and slightly concerned, because we definitely heard “2-3 weeks” and “surgeon.” 

Luckily, there was one doctor who spoke English fairly well, and she clarified this last point.  Here surgeons see patients to determine if they do or do not need surgery.  Not like in America, where you might first see the surgeon as he is scrubbing up to cut you open.  So he will only have to see the surgeon for a diagnostic exam to determine when the cast can come off.

Throughout this process, we were worried about the price.  TRICARE will reimburse us eventually, but we had to front the cash to pay the bill.  In the states, an emergency room visit, two sets of X-rays, a CAT scan, and an overnight hospital stay would be a big chunk of change, probably upwards of $2000.  And the hospitals here don’t take credit cards.  I brought all the cash we had and we were prepared to go to the bank.  Grand total:  510 złotych (about $170).  Awesome. 

New Polish words we learned:  temblak (sling), złamanie (fracture), and gips (plaster).