Where Medications Flow like Wine and Doctors Instinctively Flock like the Salmon of Capstroma

I know there seems to be a lot about death the last little while on this venue but, if I am honest with myself, writing here really helps me to decompress and unload.  A patient died today.  There was nothing I or anyone could do.  She was brought into medical care far too late.  But maybe if she was brought into a proper hospital, where defibrillators exist, highly trained personnel, are within a couple minutes journey and medications flow like wine she would still be alive, she might be sitting in a hospital bed with her grandchildren bringing her hand made get well cards. Maybe if she wasn’t born in Tanzania. Maybe if her country had a higher ratio of nurses than 0.37 per 100,000 people.  To me she seemed young, about 60, but then in a country where a woman’s life expectancy is 49, according to the best WHO estimate, She must have lived a long full life.  It was still difficult to watch her pass from this life to the next.  I think it hurts my pride as a health care worker to see someone die. Everything you have been trained to do is to keep the grim reaper at bay, when he finally shows his hooded head and sickle you don’t know what to do.    I guess what it boils down to is, in a system, such as health care, where there is a limited amount of resources you can’t save everybody.   Yes, that woman given the right set of circumstances, could still be alive today, but she wasn’t given the right set of circumstances.  I have to rest in the knowledge that I tried, and given what I had, it was a damn good attempt.  I can also look forward to returning to a system where, medications do flow like wine, defibrillators do exist, and highly trained personnel can be conjured seemingly from the walls if the need arises. However even then, it is a good lesson to learn; that even in our system, resources are limited, people who need it can’t always receive the care they need, imbalances exist, and despite your best efforts you can’t always save everybody.  In the words of a man I highly respect: that doesn’t mean you can’t give it all you’ve got and try anyway.