July 23 & 24 - Ozel Kapadokya Hospital, Nevsehir, Turkey

Sometime Sunday July 22, I recall someone cutting off my second-hand Eileen Fisher knit sweater, and getting a colorful hospital top that seemed right off the rack at Target. I was urged to eat before 3pm allowing 6 hours before my 9pm surgery schedule. At that time I was wheeled to the surgical suite on a gurney and greeted again by the anesthesiologist and numerous other surgery personnel. I am not sure how much anesthesia they gave me because I know they didn't weigh me and I know I didn't record my weight on the English medical questionnaire I filled out. (I couldn't decide if I should put it in pounds of kilograms so I left that question blank.) During surgery, a titanium plate plus pins and screws was put into my upper right arm. The suture looks about 5 inches long.

I remember being awakened about 11pm in the surgery suite and moved back to the hospital room I shared with Elaine. I felt confident that the staff was taking good care of me. I recall being poked too often for blood and also had a line where I was being given antibiotics. I don't recall any pain-killer by mouth. Most of the staff did not speak English, nor do they provide personal care such as in US hospitals. Someone has suggested that in some societies family members take care of bathing the patient not the nursing staff. I did not feel particularly clean and managed the bathoom on my own.

Due to her injuries, Elaine's surgery on her left shoulder was not until the afternoon of Monday July 23rd. Both of us regularly received trays of food that usually included soup, plain yogurt, and a bread roll. Breakfast meant ripe and green olives, tomato and cucumber slices, and milk. It all seems like a blur now, but I do believe I talked with both my son Anton and my friend Bea thanks to Bucket Solmaz, the social worker with a cell phone.
Elaine and I had restless sleep due to being in a room on the maternity ward. I could hear some newborn crying, but also saw bassinettes lined up in the hall way and some rooms decorated with balloons.

By Tuesday July 24, we received word that we would be sent via air ambulance to a university hospital in Istanbul. PC's Azerbaijan doctor Dr. Gunay Ibrahamov would fly there to meet us and then accompany us to Washington, DC. But 2 things happened before we could leave the hospital in Nevsehir. They needed to know the bill would be paid, and my doctor (Orthopedic Surgeon Dr. Ekrem Erdogan) insisted I needed a transfusion or he would not approve my discharge. This got to be comical - to us - when they showed us the faxed guarantee letter and the bill for each of us in Turkish lira. It was pretty apparent that the hospital felt $5000 guarantee would not cover the bills for 38,000 and 47,000 tL!!! Once that was cleared up, I submitted to a 30 minute blood transfusion. Dr. Erdogan had earlier spoken to me about his son studying to become an Iman in Pennsylvania so he took the time to get for me an English book Muhammed: Messenger of God.

After the transfusion I was wheeled to a waiting ambulance that took us finally to the Nevsehir airport. For once I remembered my camera and took a couple photos as we spotted the twin-engine plane we would take to Istanbul. I can't believe I did that but I did. Elaine was on a gurney but I was able to sit up with the nurse in back plus 2 doctors and 2 pilots from SOS International. The flight was nearly 2 hours and when we landed at the airport in Istanbul we waited and waited for an ambulance. By the time we arrived at the designated hospital it was 8pm. We were wheeled into a fabulous emergency room and greeted by handsome doctors.They were dumbfoumded. Who were we? and what were we doing there? We had no medical records or xrays with us, and for a moment we thought we were at the wrong hospital. SOS did not make a mistake; we were in the right hospital. They asked for our passports, we were briefly examined,  then moved to a fabulous suite of rooms to await doctors' rounds the next morning. We were surprised and relieved to be there.