Machete

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Just a quick one to talk about a patient that came in the ambulance today.

A man had been working in his garage this morning when a disgruntled ex-employee came and attacked him with a machete.

He had a really deep cut to his arm which was almost to the bone (it had gone through all the skin and fat layers), and a cut to his cheek which went almost the whole way through, and a couple of other superficial ones. He was ok, but going into shock so needed fluids, and all the wounds needed stitches. He was a bit out of it, but the fluids helped bring him around again. Shock makes me people a little illogical though, as he refused to let the doctor clean his wound because it hurt too much, but then also refused any pain relief. The nurse had to spend a good ten minutes trying to reason with him to let her give him pain relief and local anaesthetic before they started stitching.

The most shocking thing was just how normal the doctors found it to have someone with machete wounds. The only questions they asked about it was if the machete looked clean, and if they'd used an ice pick as well! Crazy. But everyone has a machete here for cutting coconuts and things, so it's much more common than any knife wound.

Once we'd finished, the police arrived to talk to him. It was all a bit surreal.

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