btp is a teacher now

Oh Boy. Hi Plaid's mom! Your daughter is a great artist. Go buy her something fancy.

I've really been neglecting this. In large part because of other projects which I have also had difficulty in completing. But that's the same story I've told a thousand times.

Anyway I am officially attempting to transition out of this job. I mean, I've been trying to do that for months now, but I am officially in the home stretch. My last full-time day was yesterday, now I'm PRN (scheduled to go only once a week). The rest of my time (theoretically) will be spent trying to acquire and prepare for a job teaching highschoolers things about science. It should be a very pleasant change (and one I am highly anxious about).

But my last day was not really a great one. Especially because it reminded me too much of the official Worst Day as a PCA. (hint: Worst Days are when people die.)

This 80 something year old lady came in saturday night. She was complaining of weakness and had been admitted for kidney failure. From a vitals perspective everything was okay, except she had fractured her shoulder recently.

Oh and her blood pressure was like 80/30.

BLOOD PRESSURE LESSON:

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SpoilerI tend to give people this speel when they seem worried about their BP. It can be scary for them. I come in and hook a machine up and it squeezes their arm and then some number pops up on the screen and it means they are either good or bad and they have no idea why so I tell them:

The top number is highest pressure in your bloodstream, when your heart is pushing blood into your arteries. The bottom number is the lowest pressure, when your heart relaxes.

The best number is 120/80, but you can be in a range around that and still be okay, like 160/90 is alright or 90/60 is okay but both are still high/low compared to where you should be.

When it gets too high, say 200/100 then you have way too much pressure pushing on your veins and it can start to damage them and break things off. High is bad over a long period, but we can manage it through medication.

When it's low, that can be bad right away. See blood pressure is determined by two things: The amount of blood in your body and how big your vessels (veins/arteries) are. If you're dehydrated, that means there isn't a lot of blood in there to fill your vessels and the pressure is low. If something is causing your vessels to open up, then there's more space your blood needs to fill and your pressure goes down.

Generally, when BP is low (in the 80's/ in the 40's) is when you start to worry an ask about blood transfusions, etc.

So that's low.

We put an IV line in her quickly and started pumping her with fluids. If you up the saline in her blood it will up the total blood volume and her pressure will go up to good levels.

Good job team, work is done. See you in the morning.

Morning, 12 hours later:

I come back in and bring my vitals machine. I greet the lady and reminder who I am, that I was here yesterday, and that I just want to check her blood pressure.

She s....oh hey my cute girlfriend just walked in guess I'll pick this up later...