Cary Duathlon Race Report: Part Three

This is Part 3 of 3 of my Cary Duathlon 2010 Race Report.  Part One is about how I split my head open on the way to the race.  Part Two contains the details of the actual race.  This part is about my trip to Duke Urgent Care center to get stitched up.

After the awards ceremony, I decided it was time to go get my head wound taken care of.  I was really dreading going to the emergency room.   That always involves hours of waiting, especially if your injury is not life threatening.  Seeing as I had just done a race, my injury was definitely not life threatening!    After a race, all I want to do it go home and take care of my bodily needs: I like to shower and then eat, drink, pee, sleep, repeat.   I was not looking forward to sitting around a waiting room all sweaty and smelly in my race clothes.

As I drove back toward Chapel Hill, I called my husband and told him about my head.  He was of course very worried about me, but I assured him I was fine and just needed to get it taken care of, but that it didn’t hurt or anything.  I asked him to google urgent care centers.  Maybe I could find one that would accept my insurance, so I’d save a trip to the hospital.  He found the Duke Urgent care place on Fayetteville road, and it was part of the Duke Affiliated physicians network.  Great, my primary care doctor is part of that network, so they probably also take my insurance.   Their website stated “Current wait time: 75 minutes”.  That didn’t sound too bad.

When I arrived at the facility, the markerboard still said “Wait time: 75 minutes”.    I asked the receptionist if they could take care of my head wound.  She immediately called up some nurses. I think they thought I had a serious head wound and they were concerned about me.

I insisted that they check if they accepted my insurance before incurring any charges.   They seemed surprised about that, but I didn’t want to walk out the door with a huge medical bill!    They did check, and I was covered with just a $30 copay. yay.  They even were able to pull up all my medical records since my doctor is in the same network and all the records are computerized, so that was great.

Then they sent me back to the nurses who were waiting for me.   One nurse took my vital signs and asked me what happened.   I explained that I had whacked my head with a car door 5 hours ago, and then did a 3 hour race.   The nurse said they thought I had crashed on my bike.   They didn’t seem so worried about me any more.  Oh well, at least I bypassed their 75 minute wait time.  My lucky day.

Then another nurse took me to a different examining room and removed the bandage.   She pulled out a laceration kit and other supplies.  She said the doctor would be in soon to have a look at me, then she left.   I took a picture of my head:

After a little while, a fellow who introduced himself as Dr. Kennedy came in to have a look. He said I definitely needed stithces. He seemed very interested in my race – I think he must be a runner. He looked like a runner.

I asked him about scarring and the possibility of plastic surgery. He said that yes, due to the depth of the cut, I would have a scar. And the fact that my wound was vertical rather than horizontal was worse, because a horizontal scar blends in better. I told him next time I klonk myself on the head, I’d try to keep that in mind. lol.

He went on to say that, unfortunately, the only way to get a plastic surgery consult on a Saturday afternoon was to go to the emergency room. And even then, they don’t always call in the plastic surgeon. He also said that the fact that I waited 5 hours to come in for care made it less likely the emergency room staff would call the plastic surgeon, as they like to work on fresh wounds. Dr. Kennedy felt my best course of action would be to get stitches now. Then, after 9 months, if I was unhappy with the way the injury healed and matured, I could have a plastic surgeon revise (fix) the scar. Dr. Kennedy seemed to know what he was talking about, so I trusted his advice. And I hope plastic surgery revision later on is covered if I need it. I won’t hold my breath on that one!

Dr. Kennedy next gave me lidocaine injections to numb the area. Then he left and the nurse came back to wash the wound. At this point my body was rebelling at me for not taking care of it after what I put it through during the race. It was nearly 3 pm and I hadn’t yet eaten lunch. And I had drank a ton of Heed and water after the race, so my bladder was full. And I smelled really bad.

The nurse finished washing the wound and left. It was not long after that the doctor came back to do the suturing. It seemed long, tho, because of my bodily discomforts. The doctor had me lay down flat. He put a cover over my face which had just a hole around the wound. That was a little bit suffocating. Then my feet started to ache really badly. Weird how putting them up made them ache. It reminded me of my trip to the medical tent after my ironman, and how my feet ached. That’s exactly how they felt now.

Dr. Kennedy started doing the stitches, and kept asking me if I was okay. I kept saying yes. Nothing he was doing made me uncomfortable. I tried to be as relaxed and still as possible, so he could do the best job on stitching as possible. But it was incredibly difficult, because my feet ached and my bladder was screaming at me and I just wanted to go home and take a shower. Once, I replied to his questions about how I was doing that my feet hurt, and could he please inject them with lidocaine. He said no, that would be a bad idea. To get through it, I had to use the same kind of mental tricks I use during races – imagine I am somewhere else and shut out the discomfort.

When he was done, the nurse came back in and put a dressing on the wound and gave me instructions and all that stuff. I didn’t ask any questions, because all I could think about was getting to a toilet, ASAP. As soon as the nurse let me go, I made a bee-line for the bathroom. OMG, what a relief that was! Then, finally, I could go home and take my shower and eat some food and get some sleep!

Here is a picture of my stitches after I took a shower. I think Dr. Kennedy did a very clean job on the stitching. I am very glad to have a great Urgent Care center nearby that takes my insurance…I definitely recommend them.

Here is another picture of the stitches the next day: