Dr. Bloom’s Near-Death Experience

[Brad Rose]

Inert as a bag of dirty laundry, Dr. Bloom tripped, then, tumbled down the carpeted stairs that led to his home's basement utility room.   At least one thing they say about near death experiences is accurate; events slow down, as the brain speeds up.  He carefully observed how, mid-fall, his mind glanced upon the most banal of passing subjects: had he paid his last Visa card on time; had he returned Tuesday’s phone call to his freshman daughter who was in the middle of her first, grueling year at Harvard; had he, in fact, lost the extra key to his pied-a-terre, down town?   As the ninth stair dented his amazingly well-preserved, 67 year-old frame, Dr. Bloom further wondered if he had  recently told his wife that he loved her above all else?   Then, before he came to a dead-rest at the bottom of his stairs, he recalled all the surgeries he’d performed during a distinguished career, in which he’d left---ultimately undiscovered---one or another small sterile instrument in the patient’s unsuspecting body cavity, as he nonchalantly asked the chief nurse to finish tidying-up the loose ends of the incisions he'd made.

[Mike Handley]

I really liked the NINTH stair. It's the dash of vanilla extract in my banana pudding.

[Brad Rose]

@ Judy. Exactly.

[Judy Thompson]

pied-a-tierre, eh...wonder what happens when someone (probably his wife) finds that extra key; he may well be glad to be out of it, the old goat...

 

this is fun, and a bit scary when you realize it's not fiction.  Good heavens, doctors are human.

[Gita]

There's a profession called hospital risk managers and they live in direst fear of such happening. "No clamp left behind" is probably on a sign in some  OR, somewhere. I have seen the x-ray evidence of  instruments in bodies. As to Bloom, it speaks well of him that he hoped he had told his wife that he loved her.  It speaks well of you, too. Now I have a question. How come you never comment on my Sixes?

[Jamie Hogan]

Really enjoyed the slow-motion of this, and it's entirely correct - events do slow down as the brain speeds up. I've experienced it, and I'd like not to again, but you seem to have time to think of anything and everything and the things you think of are so random and strange. Great piece, Brad.

[Brad Rose]

Thanks Ron and Angela. I like this little ditty. I read the other day in the NY Times that there were 4000 cases of surgeries in the US that left instruments or other medical paraphernalia inside the patient. (I suspect this figure is under-reported.) So I wanted to use this little factoid in a 6 sentence story.

Thanks again for reading and your comments

[Ron. Lavalette]

This was near-death for me, too; almost killing me with enjoyment.  Thanks.

[Angela]

Fantastic little story.  He is so human, that I'm not sure I would have liked him when he was alive.