Aurie Riggins: The Code to Nursing

All was quiet except for the sound of the monitor flatlining. Slowly sniffles started filling the air as well as footsteps fleeing the room that was only separated by a thin curtain from the rest of the chaos. I was in shock. An hour had passed and ultimately, we had been defeated. The young man that was barely 23 was pronounced dead in the bed that sat in front of me.

Over the summer I worked in AnMed Health’s Emergency Department as an extern. I was paid to shadow a nurse and perform tasks such as obtaining vitals, monitoring patients on an EKG monitor, inserting catheters, essentially helping wherever I could with the skills I learned in nursing school. I had made it through almost the entire summer. I had learned new information, new skills, and doubled my confidence. But, in one of my last shifts, we had our comm’s guy, who took calls from the ambulances, come out and tell us we had a code.

I was so excited. I had never seen a code run before, I had never done compressions before, but after the summer I had almost finished, I was ready. Over all the chaos of the nurses prepping, I didn’t hear any information on our patient or what had happened, so when the gurney rolled in carrying a young man around my age, I froze. My nurse quickly pulled me into the room which snapped me out of it. A line formed at the head of the bed to complete compressions. As I was unable to complete tasks that a license requires, such as give meds, I was standing second in that line. Verbal orders from the doctor were being called out as nurses stuck the patient to start a second IV to the one the EMTs had placed. The EMTs started calling out the story they received and saw. “23-year-old male with no pulse and witnessed electrocution. Civilians worked him at the scene before our arrival for approximately 20 minutes and we’ve been working him for 30 with no pulse return.”

“Pulse check!” Compressions stopped and the doctor used the doppler to check for a femoral pulse. Nothing. “Resume compressions.” The girl in front of me hopped on the stool and started pushing on the boy’s chest. I was next. More meds were pushed. More breaths were given. More people started entering. “Pulse check!” Again, nothing was heard on the doppler used to check the boy’s pulse. “Resume compressions.” I jumped up and started mimicking the people before me. I wanted to make sure to get the chest deep enough to make the heart pump and come back up enough to fill the heart again. Over and over, I pushed this boy, hoping to be the one to bring him back. “Pulse check!” Nothing.

This cycle went on for around an hour. No one wanted to stop working him because he was so young and healthy. Eventually, the doctor called pulse check one last time, and still nothing. The time of death was called. The monitor rang out the sound of a flatline. Slowly people started crying and fleeing the room. My nurse pulled me to the side and asked if I was okay and all I could say was yes. Even if I wasn’t, I had to be. This boy had a family waiting in the waiting room for someone to tell them he was okay, and I had to stand and watch as they told them he was gone. In that moment, I had to be strong enough for both myself and his family.

After speaking to the family, I took a minute to myself. Allowed myself to feel all the things. I imagined someone telling my parents I was gone and how that would break them. I had never questioned if I wanted to be a nurse until that moment. I asked myself if that was something I could do again. I questioned if I said the right things or if I said enough. I wondered how often this would happen. I thought about how this would affect me going home. That was easily the hardest thing I had ever done, and I didn’t know if I wanted to do it again. I sat there contemplating and eventually went back to work.

After a few minutes of returning to my shift, a family member walked out of the room. She looked around looking upset and confused so I made my way over to her. I asked her if there was anything I could get for her, water, a blanket, tissues? She looked at me and told me no but thank you. I told her it was no problem, and she told me again thank you, not for offering her any kind of item but for helping her family.

I was baffled. This woman had just lost someone important and close to her and she was thanking me.

That’s when I asked myself again if I wanted to be a nurse. I thought about how I could help people through hard times. I thought about how I could be the one to save a life. My mind started turning the negative thoughts into positive ones. There are hard days, days you might want to quit, even days you want to scream, but in this moment right here, I realized it was worth it to me. It helped me to see the reason I wanted to go into nursing again. I want to help people, whether it’s by simply checking a temperature, giving medicine to help them feel better, consoling a family dealing with a loss, or even hopefully saving a life.

Aurie Riggins is a nursing major from Pendleton, SC. She will graduate in May 2025 with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. Aurie completed an externship in the Emergency Department at AnMed Health in Anderson, SC where she plans to work as an RN after graduation.