On rounds one morning, we were talking to a patient and I notice that one of the pillowcases was stenciled with black letters saying “Property of X Hospital.” What was interesting is that we were in a completely different hospital, Y, about two hours away from the hospital stamped on the pillowcase. That got me thinking about hospital linens.
What I am assuming happened is that this pillowcase came with a patient who was transported, presumably in an ambulance to this hospital, on a gurney and then the pillowcase ended up circulating through the linens of hospital Y. That got me wondering about what sort of things hospital linens see in the course of their service. They are there in labor and delivery when new life comes into the world. They are there when people are being treated for illness, and they are on the bed when a patient passes away. A simple cotton sheet or pillowcase sees a lot of personal tragedy, as well as the triumphs of modern medicine. They touch against the skin of the ill, forming both an important barrier, but also comfort and warmth, often at a time when people are feeling cold and alone in an alien environment.
During our first year of medical school, we were given some scrubs for our anatomy lab and told that we should exchange them down in the hospital basement lines area. Apparently they didn’t want first year medical students hanging out in the hospital locker rooms getting in the way. As far as I know, I was one of the few people who actually regularly went down there to exchange dirty for clean scrubs, which ended up being a useful experience. I got to know some of the people who worked in the hospital laundry, and got to spend some time exploring the basement and tunnels of the hospital complex. It also gives some insight into the vast set of things that go into the hospital enterprise. If there wasn’t a whole group of people toiling down there, there wouldn’t be clean scrubs and linens and there we be a lot of spread of infection. This, admittedly, modest part of the hospital enterprise is very important.
It takes a huge of amount of little pieces to work together to deliver healthcare. From pillowcases to the instruments used in functional neurosurgery. They all need to work together, to mesh together in a complicated web-like pattern of complexity. Even the simplest part of the interconnected web can have its own stories and adventures.
