OH @#%^&!

We spent the evening at Primary Children's Hospital with Zander. Michael was picking him up from the bus stop and Zander wanted to race. Michael accelerated quickly, felt a bump, looked in the rear view mirror and saw Zander on the ground. He immediately stopped, picked him up and brought him to me at work. The PA I work with, Gay, decided we would be better going somewhere else. We have an xray machine, but the M.A. wasn't sure how good of xrays she could take of his hip, which was hurting the most, and Gay doesn't feel too confident reading them and our doc is out of town. We bandaged up all the scrapes he had (all on the left side: elbow, hip, stomach, ankle) and brought him home. I called my Orthopedics Instructor for advice for an uninsured patient (hoping he would offer his free services) and he highly recommended we go to Primary Children's. While I was talking to him, Michael went to talk to Zander's friend Mackenzie who was at the bus stop.

She told him what happened was as Michael pulled away, Zander grabbed the door handle (on the passenger side) and he tripped and was then pulled down under the van and the back tire ran over his mid-section. After we heard that, and the recommendation from my teacher, Michael and the bishop gave Zander a priesthood blessing of healing and health, Bishop Jensen took the other kids and we left.

When we got there the waiting room was full and we fully expected to wait. I went to check in and as soon as I said he had been run over there wasn't a second to breath. The nurse, Fritz, put a collar on Zander's neck and told me I was about to be freaked out as they put him on a gurney and rushed him back where a team of doctors was waiting. They cut his shirt off (which upset Zander almost as much as the whole night) and started checking vitals and pain and everything else. He got an IV, they drew blood, EKG, chest xray, c-spine xray, brain CT and abdominal CT. Every step along the way I told each new person we didn't have insurance, but that didn't seem to change anything, which is a little frustrating. They did have us fill out financial assistance paperwork before we left, but some of those tests didn't need to be done.

Anyway, after a battery of tests and such, Zander has a buckle fracture of the pelvis and some major bruising in his hip and abdomen. A buckle fracture is just what is sounds like. The bone isn't separated or cracked, but has a buckle in it. It's on the L back side of his hip, straight back from the hip bone in front that we can see and feel.
There's no treatment for that. They said he could be weight bearing as tolerated, but that he wouldn't want to for a couple days. He's out of school for a week and out of PE for 6 weeks, doctors orders.

He's been a great sport about all this and is in good spirits. He only cried twice in our 4 hour visit to the ER. The first was when his shirt was cut off, the second was when he was getting the CT scans and then again (okay three times) when they didn't take the neck brace (collar) off as soon as would have liked. Michael was brave too and only cried twice, which is quite impressive as every new person wanted to know how it happened. They're both so brave. =)

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All in all there were some funny things that happened along the way through the Hospital. Here are a bunch of pictures from the ordeal. Like Zander didn't stop talking the entire time. The comment the attending doc made was, "well the accident doesn't seem to have not affected the area of his speech." Zander's favorite comment to everyone at the hospital was, "NO TOUCHY!"