The Hospital

It’s a PCV’s worst nightmare. We worry that our classes aren’t going to go well or we won’t make friends, but there is one possibility that absolutely sends shivers down our spines.

I remember the medical sessions that we had during training. Minor problems will be treated by the Peace Corps doctors. Bigger problems earn you a ticket to the medical center in Thailand. If there is a serious problem you get sent to Washington for treatment. Surgeries are almost always done in Thailand or Washington except for emergencies like appendectomies.

Well, that was the situation I was facing. After being sick for three days, the pain that was in my abdomen started traveling toward one area just the left of my right hip. I tried to ignore it and pretend that the appendix could be anywhere, but the pain became clearer. I googled appendicitis and the pain was in the same spot. I tried to ignore it, but I couldn’t. I called the doctors and they told me to be on a bus to Kiev as soon as possible.

I was shocked. Doctors usually tell you that it isn’t the worst case scenario, to wait a little while and see what happens. Now I was being told to rush out of my apartment and get to another city as soon as possible for a possible surgery. I tried to pack as best I could, but I had never been in a hospital before. I was a zombie moving around my apartment grabbing soap, shampoo, a book and things that I thought I would want. I remember thinking that it would be really important that I have socks. I’m not sure why now.

I got on the bus, forgetting important things like my passport, but everything was a haze. All I could think of was that I might have to have surgery. A doctor might have to cut me open. I might have to be in a Ukrainian hospital. One of the Peace Corps doctors, who would become my best friend before the end of the night, tried to reassure me that this was just a precaution, but with every bump the bus hit the pain only got worse.

Finally I arrived in Kiev only to be moved from a bus to a van. I lay down in the back of the Peace Corps van and tried relax as I answered questions.

“Are you sure you aren’t pregnant?”

“Absolutely positive”

“When did it start to hurt in this area?”

“About half an hour before I called you”

To me, lying in the back of a van with a high fever, the questions seemed silly. I was thankful when it was time to take my temperature and I could relax in silence. The temperature was high enough to change our plans. We were going to go back to the Peace Corps Office to change drivers originally, but instead we headed straight to the hospital. I was thrilled. I was still hoping that there was nothing serious wrong and the sooner we got to the hospital the sooner the doctors would tell me that it is just gas.

I was less excited about Kiev’s emergency care center once I was inside. The building had tall ten foot ceilings and the walls, which were probably white twenty years ago, were a dingy grey color that made me question the sanitation of the center. A steady stream of people walked by, some with bandages wrapped haphazardly around bleeding wounds, some supported by friends. My over-active, fever-fueled imagination waited for someone with a missing arm or covered in blood to walk by. After getting my finger pricked for blood work, we sat on an examination table, or a bench that looked like an examination table, in the hall and waited.

The doctor took one look at my face and reassured me, “Don’t worry. If it turns out you need surgery, we won’t do it here.” It was the only thing he could have said to me to make me feel better. I was imagining rusty surgical equipment and unwashed hands.

We also needed a urine test. So Dr. Sasha went off to find a specimen cup and came back with an empty water bottle. He cut the top off and gave it to me. My world felt turned upside down. This country where I can buy diet Pepsi and find feta cheese was suddenly failing me. Why, in a hospital, didn’t they have specimen cups?

Up to this point, the pain wasn’t too bad. It hurt when I walked or if I touched it, but it wasn’t unbearable. Then the surgeons started examining you. Dr. Sasha had explained that appendicitis is very hard to diagnose. The diagnosis primarily depends on doctors pressing into your appendix and seeing how much it hurts. So, that’s what they did. Two surgeons took turns pressing my appendix. They would put pressure in the area until they found the exact spot where it hurt. Then they would apply pressure and let it go. If it hurt more when they let go, I would almost definitely need surgery. At first I had no clue what hurt more. It hurt. Couldn’t that be enough for them? With every poke, the pain grew. The last doctor to do the test made it definite. It hurt a lot when he pushed on me and even more when he let go. All the doctors agreed. I needed surgery.

I was so numb at this point. I was in a terrifying hospital surrounded by surgeons who don’t speak my language. I needed surgery. I couldn’t react. The Peace Corps doctors were making phone calls and arranging things. I just sat on the examination table and laughed when I hoped it was appropriate as one of the surgeons told me that I should marry the young surgeon from Georgia.

Before I knew it, we were in the car again heading to Kiev’s best private clinic. There, I would see one more surgeon and get my appendix out that night. Then, as I was talking to the country director, it hit me. I would be getting surgery for the first time in my life in a different country far away from the people I care about. I started crying. Doctor Valery, who was sitting with me in the back of the car, didn’t say anything. He just took my hand. It was exactly what I needed, someone to reassure me that it was all going to be okay. I really appreciated that, when I needed it, he stopped being my doctor and became someone who I knew cared about me as a person. It gave me the strength I needed to stop crying and being afraid. This was my life. I had appendicitis and if I didn’t go through with the operation here and now I might die.

In half an hour we arrived at the clinic. I started feeling a little nervous knowing that this building, whether it had scary, dirty halls or not, was where I would have surgery. We walked up to the second floor and I almost cried again. There was a waiting room. It was well lit, had comfortable chairs, air conditioning and even a receptionist.

The rest of the night was really a blur. They prepped me for surgery. I talked to a lot of doctors and nurses and got a lot of shots. They wheeled me into the operating room and the only thing I remember before surgery was being reassured, for some reason, that they were listening to American pop music while operating.

I woke up after the operation and the first words out of my mouth asked if I really had appendicitis. I was taken to the ICU where nurses told me every once in a while that I wasn’t allowed to fall asleep. I started drumming my fingers on my chest in order to stay awake. I called Rob as soon as I got back to my room to tell him that it had been a success. I asked him what time it was. The last time I knew the time it was 10:30 and we were headed to the clinic. It was four in the morning. I fell asleep shortly after that.

The rest of my stay in the hospital wasn’t that exciting. Most the nurses were very nice, although there was one that seemed to slap the needles into my arm when she gave me shots. The food was horrible, but at least Rob came to Kiev to keep me company as much as he could. I spent a week recovering in an apartment near the Peace Corps office. After that week, I had my stitches out and was given a clean bill of health and told to stay healthy.

I thought the worst part about the whole process was going to be going through it alone. I wasn’t ever really alone though. Doctors Sasha and Valery stayed up until four in the morning just so I could wave to them as I went to the ICU. They must have known the surgery was a success before I woke up. It meant a lot to me that they were waiting there for me.

I think I’ll always still remember that week as the low point in my service. It was the only time, so far, where I have seriously wished that I was home. Yet, I made it through. I didn’t book myself a ticket on the next Delta flight to New York and I can’t wait to get back to work in September.

Best of all, I have three scars and someday I’ll be telling my grandkids about the time I got my appendix removed in the middle of the night in Ukraine.

Tagged: Appendix, Kris Wasik, Peace Corps, Surgery, Ukraine

Posted in: Life in General