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Abstract
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Bullets had ripped through his body: two holes in his right arm, two in his left chest, and one in his abdomen. X-rays revealed what we already expected by mentally following the trajectory between holes, a bullet left in his abdomen. Our team worked feverishly against the internal bleeding, but we were losing the fight with each passing second. We rapidly transfused blood products and in a heroic last-ditch effort, his left chest cavity was rapidly opened to gain exposure to his heart and main blood vessels. Attempts were made to restart his heart by compressing it rhythmically between two hands. Soon it became clear we lost the fight. The controlled chaos suddenly stopped-an eerie frozen silence across the room, "Time of death: 220 am."
No, I am not a member of the military describing an experience from a foreign battlefield. I am a trauma surgeon at one of the busiest urban trauma centers in the country. The above is a glimpse into the emergency department in our domestic warzone. I wish I could say the above gruesome event is a rare occurrence, but sadly it has become routine. In this profession I see, smell, and feel gun violence first hand every single day of my life. On particularly bad nights, blood literally spills out into the halls and I change my scrubs more than once despite wearing impervious gowns.
To get to this point as a trauma surgeon, I spent twelve years of my life in training. Along the way, I accumulated many skills to care for the sick and severely injured. Despite our training, nothing prepares us to deal with the repeated emotional toll of the gun violence aftermath. Most of the time they already know what news is coming. The screaming, shrieking, earth-shattering cries often start before I can even speak. My sullen eyes give it away. Very often I can only stammer out two short sentences, "I'm sorry, but I have bad news. Your son/daughter/mother/father was shot and they didn't make it......" a little piece of my soul fades each time.
The Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit research group that tracks gun violence, defines a "mass shooting" as one in which at least four people are killed. Our country is now plagued by mass shootings-as of July 1st 2023 there have been 336 this year alone. While this number is staggering, it only represents the tip of the iceberg. Ask anyone working in a domestic warzone and they would agree: if the "gun violence" wasn't counted by deaths alone (21,410 this year as of July 1st 2023) and instead focused on nonfatal injuries--(approximately 85,600 each year in the US) the impact is suffocating...
Language: en |