Richard Hall: I had a patient come in, initially, very vague
symptoms came in with nausea, vomiting, headache,
Larry Washington: I was nauseated, lightheaded,
disoriented, and everything. I really didn't know where I was
Richard Hall: he was actually here for his COVID vaccine. The
COVID clinic actually brought the patient to me. I took care
of him in a room we checked for COVID. He was negative cardiac
workup showed that there was no cardiac involvement. Everything
came back normal on this patient. We treated him for
dehydration. He said he was feeling much better gave him IV
fluids. And he was sent home several days later, the patient
and sub showing up back into the triage area. We're working to
triage I recognize the patient, wife, kind of wife went ahead
and explained to me that they were seeing that two local area
hospitals, nobody could figure out what was going on
Larry Washington: I was laid back my eyes was dazzling in my
eyes and everything. I couldn't hardly breathe. Good. No good
hardly talk. Oh, recollect he was. He was clowning with me. My
way. So he was calling with me when he was joking around each
other. He was very professional, though. Yeah, he was very
professional. He got me back there. In the.... in the back to
the emergency problem quick. Yeah, you know, ask me questions
about, you know, I told him how I was feeling. As soon as I
leave the house, and stay outside for a while and they
think riding around in the car, I'm alright with that, but as
soon as i come back in the house. And if I lay down and
wake up, I'm feeling sick.
Richard Hall: I was thinking, you know, what's going on? There
has to be something going on in the home. And at that point, I
looked at the spouse and said, How are you feeling? Sorry, I
reached out, I had to ask further questions. Because
something wasn't adding up, the wife began to explain to me that
she was starting to have symptoms, she was having a
headache, she was starting to feel a little nauseous. I asked
the wife, you know, if there was any recent work done on the
house, the wife had told me that. No, they live in apartment
complex, but they do believe that the landlord had a new
furnace put in, and light bulbs went off at that moment. At that
moment, I told her I did not want to go back into the home,
that I wanted her to go ahead and call the gas company to have
somebody come out for us charge, they would go ahead and check to
see if there would be carbon monoxide present. We took the
patient back to be treated. And about an hour later received a
phone call from Consumers Energy stating that whoever the nurse
was that had been come out had possibly saved their lives along
with some of the some of the residents in the apartment
complex.
Larry Washington: Wow. Now, how was that feeling? Oh, I was
feeling lost in a sense, really, you know that? Hey, I coulda
lost myself, my wife, you know, in the house, if I kept on
breathing it, we could have wound up waking up dead one
morning and you know, VA was very instrumental in saving me.
Yeah. Yeah. after that. I went back in housing and died up in
there.
Richard Hall: The following day, the patient came up. And I was
training. I had two students with me from local university,
University of Detroit Mercy, and the wife wheeled the patient
and, and they sat down they said, Rick, I'm on a yes, they
said, thank you so very much. It was carbon monoxide. And she
gave me the biggest hug and gave me a kiss on my cheek. And it
gave me a hug and they said you saved our lives.
Larry Washington: Thank you. Hey, I see you were right on. I
said, you're the only one that could tell me anything about
what was going on. Richard. Mr. Hall . Richard Hall he figured
out.
Richard Hall: It was impressionable on the students.
The students I had, they were like, oh my goodness, to come
back to to know that I had that effect on somebody is it it's a
greatest feeling in the world? It really is. It's wonderful.
That's why I do what I do. That's why us nurses do what we
do. My dad's a Veteran. I'm a Gulf War veteran. I can think of
nothing greater than not only to give back to my brethern, but
again to care for the community in which we reside.