Lessons an ICU nurse learned from a serious injury
Nurse Carmelita Kinjo was eager to begin her night shift in the intensive care unit at the Veterans Administration hospital where she worked. As her thoughts turned to the evening that lay ahead of her and the patients she would tend to, she slipped on a wet floor. Someone had forgotten to replace the sign warning that it was wet. Kinjo fell backward, hitting her head and slamming into a wall. Despite experiencing some back and head pain, Kinjo spent the next two hours providing care to her patients before another nurse took over her shift and she could be seen by a physician at the hospital's emergency room.
She didn't know it at the time, but Kinjo's life was about to change. Diagnosed with cervical and lumbar stenosis and nerve damage to one of her hands, Kinjo was unable to return to her job as an intensive care nurse. What is more, she ended up enduring years of shooting pain and numbness as she struggled to cope with the health-care system and her disability.