2015-12-19
【Aiden in English】
Everyone in the Greater Philadelphia Area knows about CHOP, considering that the name already includes the word “Philadelphia”. Based upon what my mom tells me, I’ve been here when I admitted into its Emergency Room at about two years old because of fever of 108oF/42.2oC. This time around, it wasn’t much better. The fever I had reached 104oF/40oC just today and had lasted for 10 days now. And so, CHOP, it’s nice to meet you again.
From what mom keeps telling me, I’ll be here until three o’clock in the morning. It could be true if it was a little later than nine o’clock as I rushed into this ER. Unfortunately, it can’t take six hours to find what bacteria are infecting me if bacteremia is diagnosed from the blood culture or what virus is so invasive that my immune system has been knocked down in the past ten days. Anyway, tonight should get me some answers as to how I am still sick with normal X-ray and no other typical flu symptoms. Pediatric medicine did nearly nothing. It temporarily stopped the fever when I took Advil, a fever reducer. As soon as the medication was gone, I was burning up as usual. The fever became worse too. Soon, Advil wasn’t even lasting four hours. On the first day of fever, I took one pill of 200 mg Advil and felt fine for an entire day. After the meds, I needed around four pills a day, and the fever still was up there. I couldn’t bring it down anymore. I went to see my pediatric doctor on Day 5 and was given 500 mg of Azithromycin daily. At the time, Dr. Galena thought instantly that I might suffer from a bacterial infection because the fever had hiked longer than viral flu could contribute to. After a course of 3-day antibiotic treatment, the fever came back once again. Mom had to pull me out of school for one day, which piled on a lot of work. As she noted that my pills weren’t working, she made the decision to go to CHOP at nine o’clock in the evening.
The emergency room I was held in was quite simple, with a bed and three chairs. A bunch of hospital supplies was located behind me. I had like five hundred nurses come and go, each giving a small something or checking my temperature and pulse. It hadn’t really dropped even though I alternatively took 650 mg of Tylenol and 400 mg of Motrin for 6 hours. I got two blankets on and still felt like the Arctic Circle in the room. My body was like a microwave, and the doctors didn’t seem a bit worried. That actually bothered me because either they were missing something, or that this was normal, which was apparently not for me.
At around midnight, I got an IV line in my right arm and the blood was drawn for C-reactive protein (CRP) and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) in addition to the comprehensive metabolic panel (CMP) and the complete blood count (CBC). I’m not going to describe it, and let’s just leave it as it hurts. A lot. But I guess mom was right about one thing. The process was going to take until three in the morning. The doctor returned two hours later while I was sipping some electrolyte-boosted Gatorade that tasted like poop and watching the college football replay of yesterday’s game. My CRP and ESR behaved normally, except the fact of a virus that was going through me. With the perfect results for both inflammatory markers, I might just have a simple, everyday viral syndrome excluding Epstein–Barr Virus. It was totally not worth going through a whole lot of the pain in coming here. All mom said was that it was a “just in case” kind of thing. Well, “just in case” you don’t know, I’m still alive, and the virus is quite normal up to date. I’m not going to Chinese school today because the doctors said so.
【红霞译文】
在大费城地区，费城儿童医院可谓家喻户晓，人们顾名思义，单从名称上就能锁定它的地理位置。据妈妈所述，我在不到两岁时曾因华氏108／摄氏42.2度的高烧而被送进该家急诊室；十年后恰逢相似的冬季，本人健康状况再度堪忧，这回虽说体温仅有华氏104／摄氏40度，但到目前为止高烧已持续了十天之久，正因如此，我才会与费城儿童医院不期而遇。
妈妈有言在先，时钟若不指向凌晨三点，我休想出院离开这里，谁叫我晚上九点多钟才来急诊室报到。如果患上菌血症，六个小时不足以完成血样培养，弄不清哪种病原菌也就谈不上确诊一说；假若怀疑病毒感染，要找出过去十天来肆无忌惮破坏我免疫功能的病灶绝非一朝一夕的事情，总之，今晚我起码可以得出专家诊断，为什么胸部透视正常、没有咳嗽鼻塞等一般性感冒症状却仍然发烧不止。儿科药物对我几乎不起作用，布洛芬只不过暂时降温，药效一过，我立马又像先前那样发起烧来，而且越烧越高；没吃多久，降温药效甚至达不到四个小时。第一天发烧时，我只要口服一片布洛芬就能顶住全天；渐渐地，每天连用四片都撑不过来；再往后熬，即使吃了也不管用。发烧第五天，我去看了儿科医生，格利纳大夫一听说发烧天数，不管三七二十一即刻开处方每天500毫克阿奇霉素，因为他认为通常病毒引起的发烧最多不过五天就完，而细菌引起的炎症才持续这么长。哪知三天抗菌素疗程结束，我继续发烧。妈妈不得不劝我休学一天，结果请假并未幸免堆积如山的作业。她十分清楚抗菌素治疗无效意味着什么，于是决定带我直捣费城儿童医院，哪怕时间已是当晚九点钟。
我所呆的急诊室布置得非常简单，一张病床、三张椅子、背后还有医疗用品。护士们犹如走马灯跑龙套一般进进出出，干这干那忙个不停，一会儿查查体温，一会儿好好脉搏。六个钟头内，我交替服用了650毫克泰诺和400毫克美林，身上加盖了两层毯子，但仍旧感觉房间冷得像掉进了北极圈，此时体温宛若加热的微波炉，医生见状似乎无动于衷，不能不引起我的忧虑，难道他们疏怠职责，或许早已见怪不怪，可我毕竟是卧床不起的病人呀。
午夜时分，我右手臂挂上一条静脉输液线，抽出的血浆除了用来做综合代谢检测和全血细胞计数外，还要分析C反应蛋白和红细胞沉降速率，我不想赘述细节，但疼痛令人难忍，感觉极其明显。有一点妈妈说得没错，这么折腾下来至少要捱到第二天凌晨。两个小时后医生来的时候，我正在一边喝调节体内电解质平衡的佳得乐，其味道臭不可闻；一边观看昨天大学橄榄球比赛重播，我的C反应蛋白和血沉水平正常，没啥好说的，病因只能被推断为病毒感染，因为一旦两项感染与非感染指标毫无变化，恰好说明我得了极为简单且又常见的病毒综合症，完全将人类疱疹四型病毒排除在外。早知这样，我大可不必风风火火赶赴此地，当然妈妈自有说道，不怕一万就怕万一。假如你尚不知情，顺便通报一声，我尚无大碍，仍然健在，感慨这年头病毒防不胜防，好在今天医生大发慈悲，要我不用去中文学校上课。
