Visit to the Emergency Room - May 18/19, 2024

It came to my attention on Friday that my heartbeat was racing too fast. I had gone to a clinic because I thought I might be suffering a bit of early-stage pneumonia.  The clinic folks said no, I wasn't suffering any pneumonia, but my heart was going too fast, which they backed up with an EKG.  They insisted I go to the emergency room.  

I refused to go to the ER, saying I would go home and take the medicine I had for that exact purpose: metoprolol tartrate, a sort of emergency response to too high heartbeat.  And that's what I did.  Unexpectedly, the medication failed to corral the heartbeat.

Reluctantly, a day later, on Saturday evening, I went to the emergency room, expecting a late-night conversion, similar to what happened in January, 2022.

At first, things went well, with use of another drug, diltiazem, but apparently the dose was too small.  The heart started misbehaving again, so I ended up in a sleepless limbo, waiting for - improvement. I started getting diltiazem as a drip.

I was in a big-city emergency room on a weekend night. At 3 a.m., everything stopped. Two women were wheeled in, with a mob of cops. One woman was screaming in agony: “THEY SHOT US! THEY SHOT US! THEY SHOT US!” And being shot hurts something fierce. Hoping for the best here. Some people have terrible troubles:

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Sacramento County Sheriff's Office said a shooting near Howe Avenue and El Camino Avenue left two women hurt early Sunday morning.

According to the sheriff's office, the shooting was reported around 4:35 a.m. The call came from a local hospital after the two women were brought into the emergency room.

Both women are expected to survive. 

Deputies found the scene near El Camino and Howe avenues and continue to investigate the incident.

Here I am, shortly after I arrived at 9:30 p.m., in Room C of the Sutter Medical Center in midtown Sacramento.

Floral sort of art on the wall.

Mysterious apparati in Room C in the ER.

More floral art.