Michelle talks about doing anesthesia during an organ harvest:

So. About this 3am case. Organ harvest. Basically, brain dead guy, family consented to donate his kidneys, and we were there to collect. It was something I’d never done before, though I’d done anesthesia for the corresponding surgery on the other end of the arrow (the kidney recipient, I mean), and even though I’m all for organ donation–everyone make sure that little box on your driver’s license is checked right now, go on, I’ll wait–there’s something macabre about the term “organ harvest.” I don’t know, it calls to mind scythes and hoods and druids by moonlight. It sounds like, “Oooh, we grew this nice big juicy liver, and now it’s ripe for the picking!” Ghoulish.

It was the easiest anesthesia I had ever done, because they guy was, you know, DEAD. And yet, so confusing, because he didn’t look dead. In fact, on the table, he looked exactly like all my other patients–intubated, pink, warm, lines running out of him every which way. It was easy enough to get started–move him to the table, hook up the vent, a little blood pressure control, let him ride–but I was confused with what we were supposed to do at the end.

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