It was a few days ago this happened. Life is fast and furious these days. Showings, realtor materials and classes to be taken, the time is endlessly running along. I do not have a set schedule and I have been going into Curves as I can. I go at varied times of day and there is no way to predict when I will be free to show up. I ended up going to Curves at 6 PM. They close at 7 PM so I knew I'd be one of the last people in the place because many women do not go in this late in the day.
Sure enough, when I arrived there was only the attendant (worker) and one other woman working out in the whole place. I started working out and the other woman left before I was finished with the first half of my workout. I talked with the attendant and found out it was her birthday that day. She said that she wanted to get the closing tasks done early so she could leave right away at 7 PM because she was meeting family for her birthday dinner. I tried to hurry through getting my workout done so I could get out of there and free her time up. The attendant started cleaning in the workout room and then went to vacuum in the back room. I had then finished my workout and was stretching when I heard three screams increasing in volume each time.
I ran back into the back room and found the attendant sprawled in a sitting position on the floor with the vacuum spread out fallen onto the floor next to her. She was crying and screaming and I asked her what happened. She said she fell, but could not describe exactly what happened. Looking at her forehead she had a forming goose egg that was bright blue. Her shoulder on the right side, the same side of her goose egg, was shorter in height than her other shoulder. She then tried to move her right arm and screamed out and cried harder. The she became more hysterical and said, "I can't move my arm. I can't move my arm!" She asked for a cold water bottle to put on to her goose egg so I got one for her.
We called the owner, whom the attendant was substituting for because she was sick. The owner said to look for someone to help in the nearby offices. I ran down the hall and no one answered any doors. I came back and got a cold compress for her further enlarging goose egg, now a golf ball size. We hung up and the owner said she'd call the family that was waiting for her at the restaurant to come and help her. Once we figured out she couldn't stand and couldn't move from that spot, we would not be able to walk her to a car and would not easily get her standing. Even if she could stand, she may pass out from the concussion she incurred from the head trauma.
We called an ambulance to come get her. I told her she did not have to stand up because that is what she was worried about. She needed to calm down, stay conscious and to get to a hospital to get evaluated. The shoulder was either dislocated, broken or both. Any way it is, the shoulder needed to get evaluated prior to trying to move it. Her head was now swollen to the size of a tennis ball and getting larger. She was bleeding from the goose egg, but not profusely. I rubbed her back as she periodically cried and tried to keep her calm. She kept saying, "Its my birthday."
Her friend and grand daughter showed up about 5 minutes prior to the ambulance. We tried to shield the grand daughter, but the friend that showed up did not really keep her away from the scene. The ambulance showed up about 15 minutes after we called them. The EMTs were an obese woman and a man in his late 50s to early 60s. These two did not look like the team I expected. What she needed, in my opinion, was to lay back on a board and for someone at each end to lift her onto the gurney to ferry her to the ambulance. Instead, then put a sling on her arm, ice pack onto her now softball sized swelling on her forehead and the male EMT basically yanked her standing by her other arm while she moaned and screamed in pain until she was standing. She was very unsteady on her feet.
They brought the gurney near and had her try and sit down onto it. They finally got her situated and wheeled away to go to the hospital. I left directly from there and didn't get an update as to her condition until the next day. I was surprised as to the lack of procedure the EMTs followed and how incapable they seemed to me. I would not have been alright with them up righting me in the manner they did to her. Although, I did not offer solutions as that is not my job. I just watched. Liability-wise I had to let them do the work.
Update is that her swelling went from her forehead and fell next to her eye and cheek with a black/purple color the next day. She did break her shoulder. A small fracture leading to a hairline fracture. She will be out of commission for weeks now. She has to sleep upright essentially and cannot get around by herself nor drive.
What I think happened is that she got new shoes with non-skid heels and soles on them. She was vacuuming and she went to pivot, but the shoe stuck and her momentum took her over and she had nothing to break her fall. Her full weight came down and her forehead and shoulder took the full force of the impact onto the vinyl tiles on top of the concrete floor.
If I had not been there, there is no way to tell how long she would have sat in the back room by herself. She would not have been able to scoot or stand up on her own. She would have been screaming and screaming until someone went down the back hallway or until the people she was to meet decided to come looking for her. She had no cell phone on her and the room had dense walls with little likelihood anyone would have came around as they would assume that everything was closed at that time of night. We estimated a minimum of 45 minutes that she would have sat there. She may have passed out, went into shock, who knows. We are thankful that she did not have a cracked skull or worse injuries and that she got help as soon as possible in those circumstances. I wish her well and am glad I was experienced enough with first hand witness to trauma that I could keep calm and get her help. Best wishes to her and her family. I hope in the future she can prevent this from happening again as this was her fourth fall in the last 3 months. This being the worst fall. Anything worse than this, she won't leave the hospital. Scary, what to do?
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