Anaphylactic Shock and Italian ~Public~ Hospitals

You can’t blame Tyler Bradford (T-Brad). It was an eggplant pizza. Who knew there were nuts in eggplant??

It was about 2am on a classic Rome Tuesday night. Chad and I (Topher) had already fallen asleep when T-Brad comes in waking us up asking for Benadryl. His coughs and wheezes make him sound like a lifelong smoker who has lost his oxygen tank, and worse: I see his swollen lips and puffy eyes silhouetted by the faint Roman street lights through the window.  Next thing we know, I’m shouting for Bonez (Chad) to throw me the darts and we’re cruising through the Roman night life looking for Benedryl (active ingredient Diphenhydramine, a word equally hard to say in English as it is Italian). Our English speaking bartender friend we had recently gotten to know (pre-nut) helped us hail down a cab and directed us to a hospital as Brad broke into hives like a human-sized bee sting (he forgot his Epi-Pen in the states... lmfao).

We stop at a pharmacy first because Brad hates hospitals (rightly so, and even he doesn’t know what he’s up for). I slip the driver a twenty (in euros, so more like $27.69 USD), and he waits out front. Now I’m no expert on the matter, but this girl had to be the worst pharmacist that ever existed. Either that, or mine and Brad’s Italian/hand gestures/Kardashian sized swollen lips did not get the point across. We finally made it out with some shit called Aerius? Artimes? Antihistamine? Adonis Complex? Still not sure, but my Google skills makes for a better Pharmacist than that numbskull.

Next stop was the hospital. The only way to get Brad there was to promise we wouldn’t go in, that we’d just rip darts out front and wait out the worst case scenario: Anaphylatic shock (death). We pulled up, my $27.69 still covered us, so we said some American form of “gratzie” to our driver and bounced.

We ripped a dart, and then I said I was going to go inside and see how the Romans felt about tridelta insurance (or Tri something, whatever it was called).

Worst hospital experience I’ve ever had. Romans must hate Americans. Or maybe it was because the 19 year old American girl that had just come in before us had alcohol poisoning from two beers and a shot that her friend kept calling the “Captain America” shot (Dear Italians, we’re sorry, by the way, for idiots and Marvel themed alcohol, sounds like they were made for each other though).

The front desk nurse greeted me with “how drunk is she”? We got off to a bad start. Anyway, has anyone ever heard of a “public hospital”? Well I hadn’t, but apparently it means all this medicine shit is free. But before I knew that glorious fact, which the desk nurse must have thought I knew, we got in a shouting match and a few f bombs were dropped because I was trying to figure out this trifecta insurance. Finally, a nicer Italian came up and explained what a public hospital was based on the definition rather than just shouting “we’re a public hospital!”

I finally come back outside to find Brad ripping more darts in between his raspy wheezing and ever-closing throat. He looks like a fluffy red chimney. The old pro has been through this dozens of times, so it doesn’t phase him, but the hives, bloodshot eyes, and bowtox lips were no joke. We sat for a while. I went back inside and wrote a bunch of different forms of Benadryl, antihistamines, and other stuff I found online in Italian on sheet of paper since there was no one attending the front desk. Came back outside. Ripped some more darts. More hives. Finally the old pro gave in and we went into the hospital.

Now we’re in the back of the hospital checking blood pressure and citizenship. Chad’s sending pictures of passports from home base (including a picture of the cover just in case). We wheel T-Brad back, they kick me out, and an hour later I get this text from him:

And now I’m sitting outside ripping darts and writing this article for the Almost Friday blog.

A few hours later, around 6am, T-Brad sends me home and says he can handle things from here.

Chad speaking now:

I wake up to Topher knocking over a chair as he plops onto the bed.  He mentions I should head to the hospital when I wake back up that morning, but I don’t care how much of an old pro T-Brad may be, my BME (big maternal energy) kicks in, and I throw on my jeans, order a Taxi, and down an espresso while I wait. “I’m coming for you Brad,” I think outside of a café at six in the morning, “you’re not dying in a Roman hospital today.”

By the time I arrive and see the conditions of the hospital, however, I think that Tyler may actually die in a Roman hospital today. Italy, for all it’s beautiful language, sights, and people suddenly becomes a third world country. With no signing in, or visitor pass, or any sort of officiality, the languid receptionist points me back to the hospital room where I see a hived out Brad laying next to two sleeping drunks (true to Tyler’s form if you ask me) and an old lady who may already be dead (hard to tell).

The old pro and I greet, he gives me the skinny: this place blows. No one checks on the old lady for the entire time I’m there (is she dead?). I try not to freak out (I’m no doctor, but the boy looks like he lost horribly in a game of bee-hive piñata) so I start to look up English speaking hospitals, US embassy numbers, how to get an EpiPen (jury is still out on this) yada yada.

Tyler has already asked the Doctors to be discharged twice (the IV is still in his arm) they tell him that it’ll be a minute, and we wait. Thirty minutes later however, the two doctors that had been “taking care” of our old pro are walking out at the end of the hallway, dressed in their street clothes and all but high fiving as they got through another night without doing jack shit.

Tyler is pissed, furious, and I can’t tell if he’s red from anger or if the hives have gotten worse. I’m feeding off his pent-up-Beltonian-anger and we stand up and go to what I assumed was an ICU, but looks more like a “doctors” lounge, by the way the looks of the “doctors” kicking back and laughing, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they were smoking cigarettes (the “doctors” are surrounded by sleeping/dying people in hospital beds, Duolingo did not prep me for this).

Tyler yells into the crowd of white coated nincompoops and says, “I need to be discharged and I need to know what medicine you gave me.”

The crew ignores the man. They laugh to each other.

One lady nurse/doc is laying across the desk flirting with a bald man.

I’m baffled.

“I need to be discharged! And I need to know what medicine you gave me.”

One “doctor” gives Tyler a sort of glance.

The scene hasn’t changed, however, and they are all still speaking and laughing like a shitty Italian hospital-based sitcom. The nurse lady may jump on the bald man and rip off his clothes at any minute. The glance “doctor” final turns to Tyler after what feels like hours.

“You wait.”

Tyler responds without missing a beat, “I’ve been waiting for eight hours, what else is there to do? Y’all haven’t done anything.” (not sure if they comprehend any of it, especially the ‘y’all’ part, but they do realize this boy ain’t leaving. I’m ready to fight if necessary. Chicago-style).

Finally the “doctor” that gave Tyler the glance moves to the desk and kicks me out of the room.

Fifteen minutes later the old pro comes out of the room with paper work and sans IV.

We leave, and walk back to the house looking for Benadryl along the way (finding out it’s outlawed in Italy) Tyler is looking some what better, but still like he played a game of slaps with an orangutan, he turns to me, “Well now how am I going to get laid?”

I laugh and I learn the only Italian I need to know:

“Lui e allergico alle noci”

It’s almost Friday.