All in the Family

Nobody wants to be there. Not even one person.

It is the waiting room of the Neuro Trauma Intensive Care Unit (NTICU) at Memorial Hermann Hospital, one of only two Level One trauma hospitals in Houston, Texas. The families in the NTICU waiting room almost always appear to be petrified, because they know that, at any moment, a physician might enter the room and tell them, "I am very sorry. We tried everything possible, however …."

The first few days, as a rule, the different families keep to themselves. However, as time passes by, the families usually get to know each other – they share the joy when there is good news for a family, and they share the sorrow when there is poor news for a family. The unit's many families become an informal support group for each other.

As one of the social workers for the hospital, I have seen it often. I have seen families volunteer to take families from out-of-town to their homes so that they could rest and shower. I have also seen strangers pray for the recovery of someone whom they did not even know 24 hours earlier.

There are many "miraculous" stories about the families in the NTICU. Unfortunately, there are also many times when there is not a happy ending.

On one occasion, a young man was severely hurt, had suffered a traumatic brain injury, and was rushed to our hospital. For days, his prognosis was in doubt. His mother was always in the waiting room, and I am sure she experienced a rollercoaster of emotions, and of course, she breathed a huge sigh of relief when the doctors gave her reason to hope.

Then she saw another mother in the waiting room, whose daughter had not been given a hopeful prognosis. The daughter, she was told by the doctors, would probably soon pass away as a result of the severe injuries that she had sustained in a car accident. The two mothers were soon linked together – strangers joined forever by a universal magnet – motherly pain. They became very close, supporting each other in both good times and bad times.

Ironically, the prognoses were eventually reversed. The young man who was supposed to survive unfortunately passed away, while the girl who was supposed to die is now making progress at her home in Florida.

On another occasion there were two patients – one, an elderly gentleman, and the other, a teenager – who had been in the unit for quite some time. Their families got to know each other, and became close. The parents of the teenager were always at the hospital, night and day. But, one night, the teenager's mother returned to her home while his father remained in the waiting room. The next morning, she returned to the hospital and said to the elderly wife of the elderly patient, who also remained at the hospital night and day, "I was worried about you all night."

The elderly woman responded, "I figured you were worried, because last night I was sleeping with your husband in the waiting room, and I wouldn't have missed it for the world!"

Everyone burst out in deep laughter.

Yes, support is very important – especially in the waiting room.

Discuss This Article

Have something you'd like to say? Tell us what you think! Read and post comments for this article.

Find a Job

Choose your career:

MedHunters is the world's biggest healthcare job board. Our job directory has 16,769 jobs with 2,476 hospitals and other direct employers.

We want you to find your next job on MedHunters. Need Help? Call us at 1-888-884-8242, email us at info@medhunters.com or sign up now.