I
have Meniere’s disease so when the ear pain and tinnitus started I thought I
was just having a flare up. The buzzing noise was new but I assumed it was just
the beginning of hearing loss associated with Meniere’s disease. My ear felt
full, like it was underwater; but, again, that was normal. My ear itched like
something was crawling in it; but, while not the norm, I didn’t think much
about it. When the blood oozed out of my ear I realized this is not my
Meniere’s disease acting up. This was something new. The pressure did not feel
like it could have ruptured my eardrum. I could still hear; so, it could not
have been that bad. I called my ENT and made an emergency appointment anyway.
An
hour later, I was sitting on the exam table. The doctor put the otoscope in and
looked. She gagged; and, dropping the light, quickly backed away. Stammering
she said, “Let me get someone,” and rushed out the door.
I
sat there stunned. What had she seen? What could be so bad as to cause her to
gag?
The
door opened. One of the other doctors I had seen around the office entered, and
said, “I need you to remain calm. This is something we can hopefully easily
fix.” He tried to sound soothing. Do doctors not know that saying the word
“calm” can cause people to have the opposite reaction? “I will be taking over
as the previous doctor is unable to handle your current infestation.”
“Infestation?”
I asked, with the buzzing I was hopeful I had heard him incorrectly.
“Yes,”
he said with a sigh. “Now the procedure is simple…
“Infestation
of what?” I screeched.
“Please,
allow me to explain,” he continued robotically.
I
took a deep breath and again, softly, asked, “Infestation of what?”
“Are
you sure you want to know, ma’am? I can take care of this rare condition
without giving you the details. It is unlikely that there will be a repeat
infestation so long as it is properly taken care of.”
“Infestation
of what?” I demanded.
“Maggots.”
I
started shaking, “Get them out now,” I whined. I felt tears running down my
cheeks. The itching I had been feeling since yesterday must have been them moving
around in my ear… moving in my head. “Get them out,” I screamed.
‘I
will,” he said in his calm, robotic voice. He pulled open a drawer and pulled
out a light blue plastic cloth like dentists use. Draping it over my shoulder
he continued, “I will not stop until they have all been removed. Please sit
still so I can look in your ear.” He put the otoscope into my ear and looked.
Then he went to a drawer and pulled out a petri dish and a pair of tweezers. “I
am going to take these forceps and remove the ones in your outer ear. I will
place them into the petri dish for testing.”
“Testing
for what?”
“For
classification mostly,” he said as he put the tweezers in and pulled one out.
He lifted the lid off, placed the small, squirming maggot inside, and covered
it. Then he went back into my ear for another.
The
door opened and a male nurse came into the room backwards, “Doctor Smith said
you would need saline solution for an ear irrigation.” The nurse was carrying a
tray with syringe, one of those kidney-shaped bowls that was empty, another
bowl filled with a clear liquid, and a lot of gauze pads.
“Yes
that will be the next step,” The doctor said pulling a third maggot from my
ear. “You can just put it next to the sink. Make sure they have her scheduled
for the CT,” he continued going back in with the tweezers again.
“I
will come back when they are ready for her,” The nurse murmured, putting his
hand over his mouth and rushing out the door.
“Seems
like you have the strongest stomach here,” I said trying to distract myself
from my own nauseousness.
“I
have done this once before,” he stated simply. “That’s the last one I see,” he advised
taking the petri dish to the counter. “Now I have to irrigate,” he said with
his back to me. Walking back with the two bowls from the tray, the syringe in
the empty one, he continued, “It does not seem like they passed through the ear
membrane.”
“Can you hold this?” he asked, handing me the
bowl of liquid.
“Sure,”
I said taking it with shaking hands.
“Just
sit still,” he said balancing the curved bowl on my shoulder against the side
of my face under my ear. “I am going to take some of the saline solution from
the cup with this syringe and then just spray it in your ear,” he said filling
the syringe. “It will dribble out and into the bowl on your shoulder. It will
feel odd but not painful.”
As
he began, there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” he said while still putting
liquid in my ear.
An
elderly woman came in and said, “I am supposed to take her for a CT scan
doctor.”
“Give
me a few moments to finish irrigating her. Can you assist by using the gauze
pads to wipe beneath her ear?”
“Of
course,” she said picking up the gauze from the tray next to the petri dish.
She approached and with a friendly smile began wiping the liquid from below my
earlobe.
The
doctor refilled the syringe four times before he was satisfied with the
cleaning. He explained, “Once they do
the CT scan, I will review the results.
We will then see where we have to go from there. It will take an hour or
so. During your wait I don’t want you to
eat or drink anything in case of the worst case scenario. Do you have something
to occupy your time?”
“I
have my phone,” I answered as he took the half-empty bowl from my hands.
“I will see you again soon,” he said handing me off to
the elderly woman.
