The New England Journal of Medicine has shared a first-person essay by physician Ellen M. Einterz recounting the night she found herself, as a newly qualified junior doctor, solely responsible for keeping an intensive care patient alive.
The New England Journal of Medicine posted the piece on its official account, describing the scenario plainly: it’s 1982, a new intern suddenly finds herself responsible for keeping an ICU (intensive care unit) patient alive overnight, guided at a distance by a senior resident who the journal describes as “indefatigable” — tireless, unrelenting.
Meanwhile, the essay is written by Ellen M. Einterz, a medical doctor, and is published as a Perspective piece — a format the journal uses for reflective, first-person writing from clinicians rather than original research.
That distinction matters. This isn’t a clinical trial or a policy announcement. It’s a doctor looking back at one of medicine’s most quietly demanding moments: the handover of responsibility, late at night, when experience is thin and the stakes are absolute.
The journal shared it without further commentary, letting the premise carry the weight. And it does. The image of a new intern on the phone to a senior colleague, talking through every decision in real time, will be familiar to anyone who has worked in — or been cared for in — a hospital at night.
No further details about the essay’s content, conclusions, or the patient’s outcome were included in the post.
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*This article reports on content posted by the New England Journal of Medicine. The essay is a first-person Perspective piece and does not constitute medical guidance. For any health concerns, contact your GP or call NHS 111.*
Source: @NEJM