last laugh
MY FIRST YEAR
A DOCTOR’S MEMOIR BY DR HENRY DAVEL
still recovering from the atomic bomb. I began my career as an intern in obstetrics at Discoverers’ Memorial Hospital in Florida, Gauteng. Everybody called me “Doctor”! I was a bachelor and stayed at the doctors’ quarters. One day something truly amazing happened. “Doctor Henry, will you please assist Doctor Schultz with an emergency caesarean section. He wants to do it immediately. And don’t fall asleep again.” It was the husky, autocratic voice of Sister Madge at two o’clock in the morning. When I arrived at the doctors’ change room, Doctor Schultz was naked and pulling a theatre shirt over his head. “Good morning, Doctor Schultz.” He ignored me. He was a real doctor. He could treat medical problems and do operations – today was reserved for specialists only. A few minutes later we were in theatre on either side of the patient, all in sterile green attire, white boots, face masks and brown rubber gloves. Sister Madge handed Doctor Schultz the scalpel in his outstretched hand. He asked me: “Have you done operations before?” “No, but I have assisted with a few,” I said. He handed me the scalpel. “Tonight is as good as any to do your first caesarean section.” I was excited – one of my dreams was about to become reality. I asked the anaesthetist: “May I start, Doctor?” He nodded. Sister Madge’s husky voice said: “Yes, you may start, young doctor.”
I 114 YOUR PREGNANCY
t was 1967. Nelson Mandela was in jail. Apartheid was in full swing. Elvis Presley was the undisputed King of Rock, the Iron Curtain was impregnable, and Japan was
I knew that next time I also had to get her permission first before I started. “Make one continuous fluent incision. Don’t lift the scalpel, or hesitate or stop halfway. Don’t carve or saw – not too deep and not too shallow.” The knife sliced smoothly through the different layers of skin and yellow adipose tissue. Stringy squirts of blood from the
arteries synchronised with the
heartbeat of the patient. Sister Madge handed me instruments; artery or mosquito forceps, clamps and tweezers, all at the right time. They anticipated every move that I made. I was amazed at the ease of the operation. I took a pair of scissors from the
instrument tray to cut the gut. With a reverberating thud Sister Madge hit me over my knuckles with the heavy side of a big pair of artery forceps. “This tray, young doctor, belongs to me. I am the theatre sister, and if you need any instruments from it, you ask me. You don’t take it, like you just did. Next time I will break your knuckles.” In fact, she almost did. The operation continued, quietly guided by the sister supplying
me with the instruments. I delivered a screaming little miracle. I clamped the umbilical cord twice. Sister Madge handed me scissors. I cut the umbilical cord between the two clamps, severing the baby and mother physically forever. I felt exhilarated and excited, and held him upside down by his ankles, then placed him softly onto a green sterile cloth supplied by a nurse. I opened my hand for the next instrument to close the wound. Sister Madge froze like the Statue of Liberty. Doctor Schultz frowned. I looked at where they were staring. Still inside its amniotic sac inside the womb, was a second baby. I nonchalantly punctured the amniotic bag as if it had been my intention all along. The second of the pigeon pair was a baby girl. The theatre staff congratulated me on my first major operation.
The mother glowed with pride when I did my ward round the next morning. Both babies were bonding on either side of her, one in blue and the other in pink. I enjoyed obstetrics – the end result invariably a happy mother after miracle of creation. YP
the
Illustrator: Susan Newham
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