Greetings!

I hope you all will excuse a digression from the usual President's Corner and allow me to share with you some of my personal reflections upon this New Year.

I began the New Year of 2004 in the Emergency Room of a small county hospital while on a vacation, birding on the Gulf Coast of Texas. It was a frightening experience and could have been life threatening, but for the swift action of good doctors. I had surgery and as I sit here at my computer, recuperating, I have had time to reflect on the whole experience and am, of course, first and foremost, glad to still be alive, but I wanted to share with you all how a brachial plexus injury can impact upon other surgical procedures and situations, once again driving home to me the point that this injury affects far more than just the hand, arm and shoulder.

One of the first things the ER doctor said to me was, 'You have a high threshold for pain. Most people would have been screaming with the pain.' Well, I had some pain, but even so, I wondered if this was cause enough to head to the Emergency Room. I have found that most of us do, indeed, have a high threshold for pain and this can mask other problems. We have to be careful in this area. Then, when I noticed the doc going back and forth between my eyes trying to figure out what was going on, it caused me to tell him I had Horners Syndrome, and that explained the discrepency in the pupil size in the two eyes. But what if I was unconscious? I carry a card, but they don't go through your purse unless you are in an accident and there is no one else with you. I'm still thinking about that one. Then, there is the issue of blood pressure and needles. They all have to go in the non bpi arm. It is ok when you are conscious, but once I came out of surgery and there were two central IV lines in my non bpi arm, the instinct is for them to take the blood pressure on the other arm. It only happened once, but I awoke from a drug induced sleep screaming because the automatic blood pressure device kept pumping higher and higher because it couldn't find a pulse. I still have bruises from that one time. It was on my chart, but they don't look at the chart every time and, honestly, I don't think they always understand, especially if you are in the hospital for something else. As I talked with other members of the UBPN Board, they suggested tying an arm band around that arm, as they do with breast cancer victims. This is something else to explore.

So that's my story and how I started the New Year. Mostly I am glad to be alive, with a renewed sense of life and purpose. I hope your New Year was less eventful but equally reflective.

In my next President's Corner, I will be introducing to you our newest member of the UBPN Board of Directors, Karen McClune. My goal this year is to come to you monthly and introduce a new member each month. There are 11, so that should take us through 2004. I cannot emphasize enough how dedicated the Board Members are. All the work that they do is as a volunteer and they give of their time and energy so generously. Much of the work of UBPN goes on behind the scenes, by these folk and I hope to let you know in the coming months just exactly what it is that they do AND how you can help us grow.

Best wishes,

Nancy Birk, President
UBPN, Inc.