"Please, can you feed her for a bit?"The mom thrust her child into my arms, spilling milk over my yellow gown. Sure, I replied. This was the stuff of pediatrics that I lived for. Real patient contact. The baby cooed and my heart melted.
She was a bronchiolitis baby, with a secondary diagnosis of chicken pox, so she was sent to our children's hospital. She was the absolute cutest kid ever, as she tugged on my hair and buried her head into my tummy, trying to play peekaboo with me.
My intern came in a few minutes later. "Ready to do an exam?"
I was going to be observed to make sure I knew the basics of taking a history and performing a physical exam. This baby loved me - so I knew this was going to be okay. There would be no ear-splitting screams from this kid.
I laid her down in her crib. Asked mom my questions. She started coughing 4 days ago. It was getting worse. She had some congestion and runny nose with it. She was eating okay. Normal number of wet diapers. Increased work of breathing, but she seemed to be better now.
History done, we turned our attention back to the baby girl, and I pulled up her gown to look at her chicken pox and assess her respiratory effort.
And I promptly freaked out.
Because she didn't have chicken pox.
No sirree. That outside hospital had definitely misdiagnosed that one.
My friends - that little girl had SCABIES.
I had just held a scabies infected baby for twenty minutes in my arms. I had let her play with my hair. I let her burrow into my so-thin-you-can-see-right-through-it yellow isolation gown.
I was on call tonight. And the whole time I couldn't help feeling itchy as no other.
Normally, I come home and fall right into bed. Tonight, the moment I walked through my door and realized my roommate was still at the hospital, I promptly stripped down to nothing more than what my momma gave me and threw everything into the laundry. And then I stood in the shower for a full hour.
Thank god for in-unit washer/dryer. For reals.
But seriously, I still feel kinda itchy. Scabies is gross. Blech.
