Diary Of A Reading Festival Medic

FRIDAY

08:00 – It’s a slow start as I hand out some plasters to cover a grotesque looking blister.

08:15 And you can scrap the slow start. A teen girl has just come in with a gaping wound the size of a 3 bed semi on her leg.
"How have you done that exactly?" I ask, as morbid curiosity keeps my eyes fixed on the horror scene in front of me.
"I fell down!’’ is her giggled response.
Quick clean and bandage, and I realise I’m seriously out of my depth. But hey! At least I’ve got a free ticket.

09:15 This time it’s the splinter in the hand routine. I gouge at it amateurishly with a pair of tweezers and eventually it comes free. "Be more careful next time" is my professional advice.

10:30 What does an eyeball look like that's been hit by a metal pole? It looks hideous. There's no way I’m going near that monstrosity, so it's a quick call over the radio and the paramedics swoop in.

11:10 A girl with a dead leg limps in, telling me that her sizeable boyfriend has slept on her all night. What exactly does she expect me to do? How do you un-dead a leg? "Just walk it off," I tell her, and she seems annoyed I can’t do more.

11:45 Sloth from The Goonies has just walked in. A wasp has stung him in the eyeball, which has consequently ballooned to ten times its normal size. Absolutely hideous, I think, as I radio in the paramedics.

13:10 A girl has collapsed into my arms. Have I finally struck it lucky? No - she’s pale and her lips have turned blue.
She comes round but doesn’t speak a word of English (the D grade I got for GCSE German doesn't help).
"Low blood sugar seems to be the problem!" states a paramedic.
"My diagnosis exactly!" I joke, to precisely no laughter.

14:00 I’ve given out over 100 plasters today. It's only 2pm. Cripes.

SATURDAY


10:00AM I’m posted to the 'white camp first aid post' which I’m reliably informed is the quietest of all the camps.

00:00 It’s so dull that I consider rampaging through the campsite, injuring as many people as I can just so I’ve got some wounds to tend. A kid of about 16 comes in stating he’s too stoned and needs medical assistance. I insist he doesn’t - and send him off to his tent with a complimentary bottle of water.

15:00 One of the Oxfam volunteers comes in having squirted sun cream into his eyes. "It looks sore" I say, stating the obvious while I squirt eyewash into his face.

19.55 A girl comes in with the biggest blister I’ve seen all weekend. I bandage her up, but then the supervisor looks at me quizzically. He politely informs me i’ve missed one fairly vital component: the actual bandage. I’m so keen to bugger off and see The Libertines that I've crudely wrapped her leg in surgical sticky tape. See you next year Reading.