Third day

A room companion arrived yesterday; the wards-man wheeled the other bed away mid-morning and wheeled it back again late in the afternoon, complete with patient and her personal possessions neatly stacked at her side. 

Before six this morning the sound of liquid being sipped from a cup came from behind the curtains around her bed; her husband has arrived with a thermos of hot soup for breakfast.  What a kind, caring man. 

Wen’s first language is Chinese and although she has a few words of basic English and her husband has a good grasp of the language, the hospital provides interpreters to deliver important information such as the results of the surgery, what progress can be expected together with instructions about stitch removal and other limitations during the recovery process.  In the confined quarters of a two-bed ward there is no way the person in the next bed can avoid being privy to this conversation.

   

The surgeon and the interpreter arrive and the performance begins.  The surgeon has issued these reports and instructions many times before and recites them off pat, only pausing to allow the interpreter to translate.  And so the recitation is delivered, the surgeon saying his piece and the interpreter responding with a translation delivered with the speed of machine-gun fire.

Wen was undaunted by her lack of English and a number of comical, conversational exchanges took place, not the least of which was the Cuts Competition.  I conceded immediate defeat in the Cuts Competition; even if I took into account the tiny nick below the main incision, which looked suspiciously as though either the Surgeon General or his assistant made a miscalculation or even worse, dropped a scalpel, I could not find the numbers to even equal five, never mind top it.  Wen was left triumphantly holding her hand aloft; fingers spread wide – the clear winner of the Cuts Competition.

Meal time sparked even more mental gymnastics on my part, as Wen puzzled over her meal tray and asked questions about the food.  If a nurse or someone from catering happened by, the degree of required mental gymnastics ability was suddenly tripled as we ran the gamut of food possibilities and how to actually make that desired food appear from wherever it might be hiding. 

 The other routine procedures through the day were mostly navigated successfully language-wise and on those occasions when Wen’s allocated nurse spoke Chinese, food and language problems vanished into thin air.

All mental gymnastics and comical situations aside, it gave me first-hand insight into the difficulties faced by a person in hospital whose first language is not English.  The interpreter is not going to appear to give you a rundown on the meal tray items; the best you can hope for is to have a nurse on the ward who might speak your language.

Or where possible you may resort to that wonder of modern technology, the mobile phone, for an instant solution to whatever problem ails you.