Like an ants nest

The patients on the operating list for this visit are quite young in comparison to other visits. More than half of the scheduled patients are under three years of age.

Over lunch, some of the ICU nurses took time to explain and share stories with some of us non-medical volunteers. They explained the resilience of the kids, the seriousness of their cases, and how their body works and copes after such a massive surgery.

I think Deb said it best when she said that a kids body is similar to an ants nest, all the ants have their structure and “way of life” that they are used to they just work for the best of their colony together. If someone steps in their way, they all divert and continue on. It’s sounds simple, yet it’s so complicated and every case is so different due to contributing factors.

There are always hiccups along the way, some small, others a little bigger. Some of the easy cases end up turning into the more ‘complicated’ ones, and vice-versa.

Lucky the kids have an army of nurses and doctors at their beck and call, available at any time if anything does step in their way. It is the nurses’ job, along with the expertise of the doctors to figure out what that “something” might me that’s stopping them from thriving.