IVs, EDs, and SVTs

What a surprise to pull into the parking lot on campus and have Katy get out of her car behind me and say, "I'm so glad you're here.. Can you check my pulse?" Her heart was positively racing.. not like she had just worked out or had too much coffee.
Tried to take her blood pressure upstairs without a stethoscope -- #fail.
Walked into the classroom to wait for our professors - a pharmacologist and a cardiologist - so they could advise Katy on what to do.
"Take her to the ER at Plaza immediately. Her heart rate is around 200 beats per minute. This is an emergency. She could go into ventricular fibrillation if they don't turn this rhythm over. 170 beats per minute is one thing, but 200 is quite another."

Panicking, I packed up Katy's bag and my bag and rushed outside to bring my car around thinking to myself, "where the hell is plaza?"

As we pulled up to what we thought was the ER, Katy walked inside and I grabbed our bags and thought she would just be inside. All the signs said "Emergency". No. After an elevator ride and wandering aimlessly through the halls and around what felt like a million corners, I found Katy sitting in the hidden ER on the 2nd floor. WTF, Plaza?

When she got settled into a room, the medic strapped some leads on her and ran an EKG. Her heart rate was down to 180 at this point and she kept telling everyone that she felt fine. The nurse came over and showed us that she in fact does NOT have adequate training in starting IVs. As I was snapping this photo over her shoulder with my phone I muttered, "where'd you learn to start an IV? The toilet store?" Mean? Yes. Still makes me laugh? Yes. Katy bled her own blood everywhere.

She got a 12 lead EKG done eventually and then they shot her with a bolus of adenosine to rapidly interrupt the supraventricular tachycardia (SVT; HR > 150 bpm). The adenosine worked amazingly fast and then they gave her 25 mg of atenolol (beta-blocker). So now she has to go see a cardiologist. They have no idea why her heart started racing in SVT. It's apparently not the first time, either. I hope they figure out what the source is.. that's scary.

It was an eventful morning. Just so happy I could be there to take care of Katy in any way that I could. Even if it was to make her laugh while she was getting her blood drawn and to take unflattering photos of her in the hospital gown with all the sticky leads all over her chest. Love you, Katy!