Guide to Medicine
Note: This page or section of it is following Mechanics. Do not edit this page unless the changes are reflected in the code as well. Click here for Details |
The Basics
The Brain
Everything in your body revolves around the brain. So long as your brain isn't dead, you're not dead. Everything else is just there to keep the brain alive, and the severity of any given injury is a direct measure of how much of a threat it poses to the brain.
Your brain - and, similarly, the brains of your patients - start out with an integrity of 100%. Certain types of effects can cause your brain's integrity to lower. When it hits 0%, you are braindead - and there's no coming back from that.
The things that pose the biggest threat to your brain, in approximate order of how common they are on board this ship, are:
- Lack of oxygen flow.
- Direct physical harm to the brain.
- Toxins in the bloodstream.
Lack of oxygen can be caused by many things - exposure to vacuum, being poisoned with Lexorin, and so on. The most common cause of it, though, is blood loss.
Alternately, even if you're getting sufficient blood to your brain, and even if it's chock-full of delicious oxygen, toxins in your blood will still eat through your neurons pretty quickly. Your first line of defense against this is your liver, with your kidneys playing backup, but you'll still need to clear toxins out of your blood, through whatever means, as fast as possible. See Organs and Toxins, below, for more information.
And, finally, somebody shooting you in the brain will obviously not be a good thing for your brain integrity, either. Protect your noggin, or end up as a pink splatter on the walls.
Blood Loss
Blood Oxygenation
Blood loss, insufficient oxygenation of the blood, and lack of circulation are among the most common threats to patients' brains aboard the Aurora.
Mechanically, what ultimately matters is your level of blood oxygenation. This is a numerical value, ranging from 0% to 100%, determined by:
- Blood volume: Restore blood with IV drips.
- Access to oxygen: Make sure they have breathable air (check if their internals are empty!). Dexalin (Plus) is also very helpful.
- Lungs and heart: A damaged heart is especially dangerous. Surgery, Cryotubes, and Peridaxon all directly heal organs.
Below 85% blood oxygenation your brain will start taking damage and it'll take damage faster and faster as oxygen becomes less and less available. Below 40%, it starts taking extra damage.
Pulse
If your blood oxygenation drops, your pulse rate will increase to compensate for it.
- Above 150 BPM, it will start damaging your heart. A damaged heart will lead to reduced blood oxygenation until healed.
- Above 250 BPM, the patient can and will enter cardiac arrest.
To lower the pulse, use Inaprovaline and/or Perconol/Mortaphenyl/Oxycomorphine to alleviate pain.
Blood Flow
If your heart doesn't beat, there is no blood flow. Blood flow is also reduced if heart is damaged, and can lead to low oxygenation even with full oxygen and blood volume.
Cardiac Arrest
Sometimes the heart just can't take it anymore and stops. Being in extreme pain will also skyrocket your pulse and can cause the heart to stop. This is indicated by a flatline on your medHUD.
If someone is in cardiac arrest, they are priority number one.
- If you are ever in doubt what to do, put the patient into a stasis bag. You can scan them with your health analyzer and inject them with a syringe even if the bag is closed.
- First, make sure the heart won't stop again. Was it caused by pain? Administer painkillers, a stimulant, and apply CPR.
- It could've been caused by low blood volume - hypovolemic shock. Get some blood into them with IV drips and restart the heart with some CPR.
- Was it caused by severe heart damage? You can see this if their blood oxygenation is dangerously low. Put them into a stasis bag or cryo tube, tell the Doctor that the patient needs instant surgery, then bring them in.
- It could've been caused by a lack of oxygen sending the heart into an abnormal rhythm. Restart the heart with CPR. If they have air, that's it. Otherwise, administer Inaprovaline to stabilize their pulse.
- If you are non-medical, the patient is in surgery, or you just can't get a doctor, administer CPR.
Triage
Triage is medical's word for "priority" regarding patients. The goal of triage is to stabilize patients, not cure to 100%. Generally this comes into play when there is more than one patient. Wearing a medical HUD will allow you to assess a patient's basic status from a glance. the HUD will show a "pulse line" of your patient. This is not a true indicator of health, but of their heart rate.
- a patient with a green line, and a steady pulse line has a healthy beats per minute (BPM)
- a patient with yellow, more "hurried" line has a heightened BPM, this means their heart is beating rapidly, they may be in pain, and might warrant a look
- a patient with a red and more "muted" line has a weak heart rate. this may warrant immediate action.
- a patient with a flat, flashing red line is in what is called asystole, or "flat line". this is bad
- a patient with a blue, "slower" line has a lowered BPM, likely causing depleted blood oxygenation. This is most commonly caused by chemicals such as Pneumalin
- a patient with a black line has no heart activity at all, they are either dead or lack a heart, such as IPC.
Patients who are in a critical state, or you suspect have internal injuries such as victims of gunshot wounds, should be considered a priority over "walking wounded". A person dies when their brain dies, which usually happens when their brain is starved of oxygen. People low on blood, weak heartbeat or respiration are at a greater risk of dying than someone with a broken leg. So work your way down, treating critical first, and saving those who can wait for last.
Procedures
Beyond simply using the tools available to you, there are a variety of medical procedures that you can perform on your patients in order to help heal them.
CPR
If a patient's heart has stopped, there's no blood flow going to the brain. This can quickly result in brain death, and obviously should be corrected as quickly as possible, as mentioned above. However, if, for some reason, immediate resuscitation is not possible, CPR is a good way to extend a patient's life. Every time you perform CPR on a patient, it counts as one breath if their lungs are properly working, it circulates blood a little no matter what state heart is in, and with some luck, you might be able to restart their heart. Don't be afraid to crack some ribs while you're at it, remember, if they died with ribs intact, you didn't try hard enough!
CPR consists of two parts - the chest compressions to kickstart the heart and the mouth to mouth resuscitation to give them air. To perform CPR on a patient, they must be in cardiac arrest, and for the mouth-to-mouth part, neither of you can be wearing a mask or other mouth covering. Click on the patient with an empty hand in to perform CPR. This requires both of you to remain still for a short period. This can be repeated as many times as necessary until treatment can be administered.
Blood Transfusion
If a patient has lost a large amount of blood, they will require a blood transfusion to allow for full circulation and prevent further brain damage.
- Prepare an File:IVdrip.png IV drip with a blood bag containing an appropriate blood type (see below). If available, you should use Nanoblood, that is more efficient and does not care for blood types. You can order it in Cargo or have Chemist make some from plain blood.
- Ensure that the IV drip is in Inject mode.
- Attach the IV drip to the patient.
- Monitor the patient's blood oxygen levels and pulse via health analyzer.
- If an IV drip is not available, injecting the patient with blood from a syringe is workable, if a slow and cumbersome, option, as is administering blood pills.
- Iron, nutriment, protein and saline plus all speed up the patient's natural recovery of lost blood.
Blood Compatibility
It's important to use right type, so bad things won't happen. Blood between two different species is never compatible, even if it shares the same color. The pre-loaded blood bags in the Treatment Center storage closet contain a special kind of O-negative which can be given to any patient regardless of species without fear of rejection, but donated blood should be reserved for members of the same species.
If there is no O-negative blood available, and no precise blood type match as an alternative, look for a replacement by these rules:
- Negative can take only negative.
- All types can take O.
- A can take A.
- B can take B.
- AB can take A and B.
- O can take only O.
Receiver | Donor | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
O- | O+ | B- | B+ | A- | A+ | AB- | AB+ | |
AB+ | + | + | + | + | + | + | + | + |
AB- | + | + | + | + | ||||
A+ | + | + | + | + | ||||
A- | + | + | ||||||
B+ | + | + | + | + | ||||
B- | + | + | ||||||
O+ | + | + | ||||||
O- | + |
Cryogenics
Cryo is all about suspending someone in animation and healing them to boot! If someone is in a pretty bad way, tossing them into a (correctly setup) cryo tube will help with most problems on the surface, or the cryo tube will basically act like one gigantic stasis bag, minus the genetic damage.
- The cryogenic bath will only function at below 170K.
- The lower the temperature of the bath, the more effective the stasis function is.
- The higher the temperature of the bath, the more effective the healing function is. (As the chemicals are metabolised faster.)
Triage and You: The Handbook
A large, comprehensive guide on how triage works with our current medical facility. Authored by Juani#1784 and Synnono#2558.
In compliance with NanoTrasen employee healthcare provisions, and due to the increasing stress on the Medical Department's facilities, a renovation of the Medical Bay was approved last year. The objective of this renovation is to improve the Medical Bay's capacity to treat patients, as well as to make that treatment more efficient. New policy has been implemented with the new design, and medical staff are expected to work according to the guidelines outlined in this document. In addition to the renovations, the medbay is introducing a triage system to quickly identify patients with urgent medical needs. New patients will be classified as having a GREEN, YELLOW, ORANGE or RED triage level, depending on their condition when processed. The major changes to the department are as follows:
- Centralized Triage Area (CTA): This room, equipped with two cutting-edge body scanners, will become the pillar of the Medical Bay. Located right next to the entrance, patients will be diagnosed here and assigned a color-coded triage level. Beds are available for patients awaiting treatment, organized by this triage level. Once assigned, patients will be redirected to one of the following areas:
- Intensive Care Unit (ICU): This room, intended for patients of triage level RED or ORANGE, is equipped with all basic life support measures currently available. All supplies in this area must always be kept fully stocked. This room has one fixed and two mobile treatment beds, three refrigerated closets for stabilization equipment, a supply of blood packs and medication, one cryo-treatment tube and three IV drips. The area is signified by the color red and the ICU signs.
- Emergency Surgery Pre-Operatory Room: Intented for patients of triage level ORANGE or higher. Located in a straight line from the ICU, this area is designed to stabilize critical patients, and is equipped with the equipment necessary to do so. The area has two mobile treatment beds, two IV drips and one cold storage container for blood packs. The area is signified by the color red.
- Regular Surgery Pre-Operatory Room: Intended for patients of level YELLOW or lower. Its entrance is located at the west end of the CTA, and connected through a hallway to a waiting room. Patients will be instructed to wait for an assigned surgeon to call them into the Operating Theatre here. The area is equipped with personal storage lockers and a changing room for the safekeeping of patient belongings. The area is signified by the color blue.
- General Treatment Room (GTR): Intended for patients of triage level YELLOW or lower. The purpose of this room is for the general treatment of diseases or injuries that are not urgent or do not require of life-stabilization measures. The area is equipped with two fixed treatment beds, two cryo-treatment tubes, one sleeper unit with dialysis capability, and one IV drip. The area is signified by the color yellow and the GTR signs.
Other sections of the Medical Bay have not changed, or do not follow a strict procedure for triage. Please be aware of the following information, as it pertains to the new medical layout:
- The Chemistry laboratory no longer connects directly to a publicly accessible area. For the purpose of easy access by the staff of the station, remote-control buttons have been installed at the reception desk and at the Chemistry desk. To access the desk, crew requiring access will need to get permission from the reception staff to access the consultation wing hallway.
- The temporary morgue no longer uses morgue trays. Medical staff are asked to keep the temporary morgue as clear as possible, and store cadavers in the permanent morgue on the medical sub-level as soon as possible.
- A pneumatic Medi-Express system has been installed, to allow for quick delivery of medicine to various areas of the medbay. The hub for this system is located east of the Chemistry Laboratory. To use the system, simply place the items to be delivered inside the bin labeled with the desired destination, and engage the pump. It will be delivered shortly, if the pneumatic tank is full. The Medi-Express system can deliver items to the Lobby, Main Storage and Surgery Wing.
- Windows have been installed in the Operating Theatres. These windows are equipped with an electrically-activated opacity system, toggled by a switch in each Operating Theatre. Usage of this system is mandatory during all surgical prcedures to preserve patient privacy.
- Noticeboards have been installed in the Surgery Wing for each Operating Theatre, for posting scans of any patients about to enter treatment.
- Access to the medical bay will generally be restricted to medical staff and patients awaiting or receiving treatment. Patients in long-term recovery are allowed to receive no more than one visitor at a time. This restriction does not apply to security detainees, who may be accompanied at all times by up to three security officers. Visitors may be instructed to wait at the waiting room located at the entrance of the Medical Bay. The ultimate authority in regards to these restrictions will be the Chief Medical Officer (and their superiors), who may modify them as they see fit. Charges of trespassing may be applied to visitors who violate this policy. Visitors who obstruct care to patients in violation of this policy may be held liable for resulting harm or loss of life. Please clarify any concerns with your facility's Head of Security.
Yours,
Yehtlas Mualt-Quaat, Chief Medical Director.
NanoTrasen Corporation.
Diagnostics
Damage Types
Brute
Cuts, lacerations, and bruising all make up the red descriptions on the health analyzer, normally caused by physical trauma such as punching, getting hit with something, being dragged with open wounds, slamming into walls, depressurization, etc. Sometimes high brute values may break bones, which will require Surgery, or the limb may even become dismembered! Treatment for brute damage on its own is listed below:
- Gauze: Heals 4 brute per wound. Stops bleeding.
- Advanced Trauma Kits: Heals 8 brute per wound. Stops bleeding and also disinfect wounds if applied early.
- Bicaridine: A red colored medicine which heals 5 brute per unit, meaning a full syringe will heal 75 brute damage. Overdoses at 20u.
- Butazoline: A red colored medicine which heals 8 brute per unit, meaning a full syringe will heal 120 brute damage. Overdoses at 15u.
- Tricordrazine: A purple medicine that heals all underlined damage, healing 3 damage per unit. Overdoses at 30u.
- Do not mix Bicaridine and Butazoline, as this will result in the patient taking high levels of genetic damage
Burn
Skins, burns, and scars make up the yellow descriptions on the health analyzer, normally caused by intense temperatures such as fire, extremely cold temperatures, lasers, and electrocution. Exceptionally high burn values may vaporize a limb, and can cause bloodloss on top of easily becoming infected. Massive amounts of burn damage may cause your character to be 'husked'. Treatment for burn damage on its own is listed below:
- Ointment: Heals 4 burn per wound. Disinfects wounds.
- Advanced Burn Kits: Essentially the burn variant of ATKs. Primarily used to disinfect burn wounds.
- Kelotane: A yellow colored medicine which heals 6 burn per unit, meaning a full syringe will heal 90 burn damage. Overdoses at 20u.
- Dermaline: An orange-yellow colored medicine which heals 12 burn per unit. Overdoses at 15u.
- Tricordrazine: A purple medicine that heals all underlined damage, healing 3 damage per unit. Overdoses at 30u.
- Do not mix Kelotane and Dermaline, as this will result in the patient taking high levels of genetic damage
Toxin
While Toxin damage isn't technically damage in the sense Brute or Burn damage are, toxins can pose issues to treatment. They are most commonly identified as unidentified chemicals in a patient's bloodstream via a health analyzer. Treatment for toxins is listed below:
- Dylovene: A green colored medicine which counteracts certain toxin side effects, while removing most common toxins. Overdoses at 20u.
- Fluvectionem: A dark purple colored medicine which removes all other chemicals reagents from the bloodstream. Overdoses at 20u.
- Pulmodeiectionem: A dark purple colored medicine which causes the patient to cough up any reagents in their lungs when inhaled. Overdoses at 10u.
- Dialysis or stomach pumps can be performed using the sleepers found in the GTR or ICU. This is a fast and certain way to remove toxins from a patient's bloodstream or stomach respectively.
Suffocation (Hypoxia)
Suffocation damage, like Toxin damage, isn't a real damage, but a general term for low blood oxygenation, seen via health analyzer. It may be caused by blood loss, damaged lungs or heart or lack of oxygen in the environment. Treatment for hypoxia on its own is listed below:
- CPR: Time to put those first aid courses to use! As long as you and your patient aren't wearing anything that covers the face you'll be able to perform CPR to keep the patient alive for a bit longer by clicking them on help intent. This procedure must be repeated consistently in order to be effective.
- Inaprovaline: A cyan colored medicine which doesn't actually heal hypoxia, but instead halts any further damage, and mildly kills pain. Overdoses at 20u.
- Dexalin: A blue colored medicine which forces blood oxygenation up to 50%. Overdoses at 20u.
- Dexalin Plus: A blue colored medicine which forces blood oxygenation up to 80%. Overdoses at 15u.
Genetic
Damage dealt by radiation, slime digestion, coming out of a stasis bag, which the health analyzer can only determine by means of a red prompt, requiring a body scanner for a precise measurement of genetic damage. Treatment for genetic damage is listed below:
- Cryoxadone: A pale blue medicine which heals the above damage including genetic damage, but requires that the body be cooled to 170 Kelvin or lower, usually by means of cryo cells.
- Clonexadone: A pale blue medicine which works exactly the same as Cryoxadone, but does everything faster.
- Cryo-Mix: A 1:1 mix of Cryoxadone and Clonexadone, works much like KeloDerm in that the two medicines work separately, therefore faster.
- Rezadone: A green medicine which heals genetic damage without the need for cold temperatures. Overdoses at 20u, though 10u may induce dizziness.
Radiation
Damage dealt by exposure to the Supermatter, being injected with radioactive reagents, or destroying/activating particular artifacts make up radiation damage, which the health analyzer can only determine by means of a red prompt, requiring a body scanner for a precise measurement of radiation damage. Treatment for radiation damage is listed below:
- Hyronalin: A green medicine which heals 30 radiation per unit, albeit slowly, but does not heal the resulting damage of radiation. Overdoses at 20u.
- Arithrazine: A green medicine which heals 70 radiation, albeit slowly, but has the side effect of dealing some brute damage. Overdoses at 20u.
Organ
Damage represented on the body scanner that corresponds with the trauma inflicted on organs, either by certain poisons, severe physical trauma, bones moving in the area organs are present (lower body, chest, head), or certain items necessary for function being absent. An organ is considered dead at 30 damage. The mostly deadly form of organ damage is brain damage, which leads to death at 100 damage instead of 30. Treatment for organ damage is listed below:
- Peridaxon: A purple medicine which heals 1 organ damage per unit, and heals all internal organs. Overdoses at 10u.
- Alkysine: A yellow medicine which heals 30 organ damage per unit, but only heals the brain. Overdoses at 10u.
- Oculine: A pale lavender medicine which heals 5 organ damage per unit, but only heals the eyes. Overdoses at 20u.
- Adipemcina: A green medicine which heals 2 organ damage per unit, but only heals the heart. Overdoses at 20u.
- Pneumalin: A purple medicine which heals 1.5 organ damage per unit, but only heals the lungs, and only when inhaled. Overdoses at 15u.
- Inaprovaline: A blue medicine which heals the brain if it's below minor damage. Overdoses at 20u.
Other
Blood Loss
Blood carries oxygen to various areas in the body of a patient, and without oxygenation (whether by lack of air or lack of blood, in this case) the patient will slowly decline in health until they die, therefore stopping bleeding is your top priority, and should be treated as a critical injury. For low blood levels, administering Dexalin will help with the oxy damage resulting from blood loss, and will help alleviate the risk of brain damage as a result. Critical blood levels, however, will result in massive spikes of hypoxia and annoying toxins. Blood loss also results in losing lots of nutrition. Symptoms of blood loss can be found below:
- 89% of original blood volume/501u and lower:
- Analyzer says LOW BLOOD - This is probably the first thing you'll see if you analyze someone.
- Patient feels dizzy - They will state vocally that they feel dizzy/faint.
- Patient rapidly becomes hungry - Low blood generates hunger. Oddly enough, the nutrition used doesn't correlate to the amount of blood regenerated.
- 60% of original blood volume/336u and lower:
- Analyzer says CRITICAL BLOOD LEVELS - Hard to miss text telling you to get going or the patient will soon meet their demise.
- Patient feels extremely dizzy - Emphasis on extremely.
- Patient has trouble seeing - Cloudy vision and having a hard time keeping their eyes open.
- Patient is unconscious - Not enough blood to keep them conscious, which means they can't tell you about their peril.
- Increasing oxygen damage - Determined with the analyzer, but the prompt above will probably tell you that before you read their damage.
- Pale skin - As a result of high oxygen damage, determined by examining with a grab.
- 40% of original blood volume/224u and lower:
- Aggressive oxygen damage - At this point, the oxyloss will start escalating quickly.
- Increasing toxin damage - Assuming the patient survives to this point without dying, toxins will begin to manifest.
- 21% of original blood volume/122u and lower:
- Huge spike in toxins - Like, 300 damage or so.
- Death.
Treatment to stop bleeding is listed below:
- For external bleeding cases:
- Gauze: This is the most basic item in medical to treat cuts and lacerations provided you have enough of it.
- Advanced Trauma Kit: ATKs are better than gauze as they can disinfect the wound when it's used, and instantly heals 8 brute damage per wound.
- For internal bleeding (IB) cases:
- Cryogenics: Placing a patient with internal bleeding into a (correctly setup) cryo tube will both halt (not fix) the bleeding and stop it from getting worse. This is a temporary solution.
- Bicaridine and Inaprovaline: These two medicines together (they have to be together, not separate) will prevent the internal bleeding from worsening, but will not halt the bleeding.
- Surgery: The main method of treating internal bleeding is through surgery by means of the Fix'O'Vein.
- Bicaridine: Overdosing Bicaridine (30u) will, of course, deal toxins to the patient, but it may clot internal bleeding. Generally a last resort if none of the other methods are available.
- Coagzolug: Coagzolug can help slow bleeding, buying you more time to treat a patient. Overdoses at 10u.
Once the bleeding has ceased, you will have to help the patient raise their blood count. The following are some methods to assist with that:
- Dexalin/Dexalin Plus: Will assist in oxygenating the blood, helping to prevent potential brain damage.
- Iron: A simple reagent that must be ingested in order to work. Replenishes 8u of blood per unit.
- Nutriment: Basic nutrients. Must be ingested. Replenishes 4u of blood per unit.
- Protein: Animal proteins found in meat. Must be ingested. Replenishes 4u of blood per unit.
- 20 Iron, 20 Nutriment, 20 Protein: The three reagents mentioned above in one 60u pill, which can replenish blood rather quickly as there are three separate reagents.
- IV Drip with compatible blood: Bloodbags can hold 200u of blood (a little less than half a patient's total blood volume) and is generally a fast method of replacing blood.
- IV Drip with Saline Plus: Administering 1.5u/tick of Saline Plus will rapidly replenish their blood and works for all species.
IV Drips
Speaking of IVs and blood bags, you should probably know how to use them, since blood loss sucks so bad, it's also bad by extension to not know the primary method of treating it. IVs are just objects you can pull around that transfer reagents from a container - preferably blood bags - into a patient's bloodstream via needle. This can be accomplished by clickdragging the IV onto the patient to hook them up. Here are a few features of the IV, most accessed via right-click context menu:
- Injects and draws blood. The drawing mode will ping once the patient reaches 90% blood volume.
- Transfer rate can be adjusted between 0.001 and 4 units per second, important for IB cases.
- Fits reagent containers, and is not actually limited to blood bags, good for keeping someone sustained on a medicine.
Additionally, blood bags can have their displayed type determined by using a pen on the bag.
Infection
Infections sprout when a wound isn't treated and disinfected in time, and is accompanied by a fever (check temperature). If left alone, infections can rapidly kill a patient, even exponentially if it's bad enough. Infections are commonly identified by means of the body scanner. The following are the levels of infection:
- L1 (Mild): Pain messages and the start of fever.
- L2 (Acute): More pain messages, infection becomes more prevalent and visible.
- L3 (GANGRENE): Beginning of lethal toxins, organ death, and necrosis.
The following are some symptoms of infection based on where it's located:
- Meningitis (Brain)
- L1: Stiff neck
- L2: Severe headache (+1 confusion at random intervals)
- Conjunctivitis (Eyes)
- L1: Itchy eyes
- L2: Blurred vision (+10 eye_blurry at random intervals)
- Endocarditis (Heart)
- L1: Chest tightness
- L2: Chest pain (+25 halloss)
- Pyelonephritis (Kidneys)
- L1: Lower back pain
- L2: Malaise
- Pyogenic Abscess (Liver)
- L1: Right side abdomen pain
- L2: Poor blood filtration (toxins buildup)
- Pneumonia (Lungs)
- L1: Coughing
- L2: Shortness of breath (+30 oxyloss)
- Staph Infection (All external limbs)
- L1: Pain notificiation
- L2: Sharp pain temporarily disables limb
L2 infections and lower require only 15u of Thetamycin and monitoring. L3 infections require far more. Regardless, immediately pairing with Dylovene and Tricordrazine to accompany the high toxins is a good idea. The following will go over further necessary treatments:
- Limb gangrene:
- Conduct necrotic limb repair.
- Organ necrosis:
- Request a replacement synthetic organ from Research immediately.
- Remove the organ via surgery and replace it with the synthetic counterpart.
- If the brain or heart is necrotic, the patient will need to be constantly supervised and treated to prevent death.
Fractures
Bones fractures can be separated by three identifications: hairline, fracture, and broken. These three different types of fractures no longer play any part mechanically, though from an RP standpoint, hairline is the least severe while broken is the most severe (and therefore painful). Fractures can, however, deal damage to organs if they move around. Treatment for fractures is listed below:
- Splints: A half-cast that keeps the fractured bone in place and prevents it from moving. This is a temporary remedy, and requires the following to actually treat...
- Surgery: By means of bone gel and bone setter, a fracture can be mended rather quickly.
Dislocations
Not actually a fracture or even a problem related to surgery, but it will function as a fracture in that the limb will become incapacitated. Fixing it simply requires that you stand next to the patient and use the 'Undislocate-Joint' verb. If there are multiple dislocations, a prompt will appear asking which limb you would like to relocate.
Mycosis
Unsterilized K'ois happens to be a rather tasty snack... if you're a Vaurca, anyway. If you're any other race, you're going to have a really bad time. Aside from containing phoron, K'ois (excluding K'ois bars found in unhacked vendors) can cause a myriad of problems which can all be summed up as Mycosis, a term used to describe fungal infection. Early stages of K'ois infection involve pain and coughing blood. Stage 2 brings about respiratory issues. Stage 3 involves feelings of something squirming inside, as well as phoron and K'ois paste beginning to fill the patient's lungs, dealing large toxins. Fungal spore emission begins at Stage 4 which will embed and grow more K'ois, spreading to anyone who doesn't have their own internal atmosphere setup.
Treatment for K'ois infection is dangerous for both you and the patient. You must wear internals - a sterile mask or gas mask on its own will not work - in order to avoid breathing in spores and infecting yourself. Once you've ensured your internals are running, begin the K'ois removal procedure and treat the remaining toxins and blood loss. If the patient is already at Stage 4, it is top priority that they be kept isolated from everyone else, otherwise the fungus will spread to others and make everything worse.
Mental Trauma and Policy
- All characters with a Medical Doctorate degree are capable of diagnosing mental trauma, as well as prescribing medication for their diagnosis.
- Surgery trained Medical personnel are fully capable of Neuro-surgery where necessary to treat mental trauma.
- Chemists/Pharmacists are fully capable of synthesizing mental medication, but they cannot diagnose mental trauma, or prescribe medicine.
- Psychiatrists/Psychologists are the foremost experts on this type of illness, they are the only capable of advanced treatment (Hypnosis, Crystal Therapy, and Isolation) and they should be the first to treat mental trauma when available.
Health Analyzer
Probably the number one go-to tool in diagnostics (up there with the HUD and body scanner) is the health analyzer, a pocket-sized device that you can use on a patient to assess their health. Health bar showed up? Analyzer. Someone says they don't feel well? Analyzer. Below is an example of what you would see on a slightly injured patient. Keep in mind, the basic analyzer won't show you the numbers, but only a description of their current state. Science can make an advanced analyzer, which will show precise readings.
The Body Scanner
Essentially a stationary and much bigger health analyzer. This section will cover what the screen will look like and what you can derive from it.
Overall Health John Doe => Conscious Radiation Lvl: 0 Rads Blood Status Blood Level: 100% (560u) Body Status lungs Actions |
---|
As you can see, this provides much more information, probably the most sought after info being anything below the Body Status heading.
- Overall Health
- Name: Just the name of the patient and their current state. Conscious, unconscious, dead.
- Species: The species of the patient. See below for how each race reacts differently to treatments.
- Health: The real overall health of the patient. 100 is perfect health, -100 is dead.
- => Damage: The four main types of damage that can be pulled from a health analyzer.
- Radiation Level: How many rads the patient has soaked. See Radiation Damage above.
- Genetic Damage: How much the patient's skin is falling off.
- Estimated Brain Damage: How much organ damage has been dealt to the brain.
- Estimated Paralysis Level: How much time is left until the patient wakes up/can move.
- Body Temperature: Temperature measured in Kelvin and estimated in Celsius.
- Viral Status: Tells whether or not a pathogen has been detected.
- Blood Status
- Blood Level: How much blood the patient has.
- => Reagent: How much of a certain reagent there is in the blood stream. Other is pretty much anything that isn't already on the list, which can represent either good or bad reagents.
- Body Status
- Organ: Tells how much burn and brute damage an organ/limb has, as well as information about it if applicable.
- Actions
- Print Report: Will print out a page of what you already saw on screen. Best done when the patient has fractures or organ damage. Printed reports that are no longer being used should be placed in the filing cabinet behind the reception desk.
Other Tools
Some other fancy but somewhat niche tools to diagnose issues within a patient are as follows.
Breath Analyzer
The breath analyzer is capable of ascertaining the status of a patient's lungs, and whether or not they have alcohol in their blood.
Breath Sample Results: |
---|
Not much info, but it'll do:
- Oxygen Levels: This will quickly inform you if someone's oxygenation is pretty bad. Values above 25 oxy damage will be marked as abnormal.
- Lung Health: Quick way to determine lung damage. Even one damage is enough to tell you that there's a problem. 10 damage and up indicates a rupture.
- BAC: How much alcohol has made its way into the blood, usually from drinking alcoholic drinks. Unless there's heavy intoxication (0.12 and higher) or something more severe, it's probably fine to ignore this.
Stethoscope
The stethoscope is rather ancient but it is still a valuable tool to have, as it's capable of diagnosing problems with hearts and lungs. Aiming at the chest and clicking the patient with a stethoscope in hand will tell you about their heart and lungs. The stethoscope can also be attached to your jumpsuit.
- Heart
- Weak/odd heartbeat - Heart damage or high hypoxia.
- No heartbeat - The patient is dead, or they have a synthetic heart. Or they're just joking around.
- Lungs
- Wheezing/gurgling - Lung damage or high hypoxia.
- No breathing - They are dead.
Penlight
The penlight is yet another tool capable of diagnosing organs, this time the eyes. Aiming at the eyes and clicking the patient with a penlight in hand will tell you about their eyes.
- Their eyes narrow - Patient's eyes are fine and functioning normally.
- Visible damage - Self explanatory.
- Slow reaction - Blurry vision.
- Delay between both eyes - Brain damage.
- Pinpointed pupils - Opiates.
- Dilated pupils - Other non-beneficial drugs.
- Glowing - Patient has a mutation.
- No reaction - The patient is dead or their eyes are damaged beyond function.
Grabbing and Examining
If you have nothing else, then your eyes can give you a rough idea of how a patient is doing. If not your eyes, then your hands when you grab a patient.
- Examining - Examining is simply done by shift clicking the patient, or using the right-click context menu and clicking Examine.
- Bleeding
- Bleeding cut on limb - They're obviously bleeding from the limb in question.
- Blood soaking under clothing - They are bleeding under the clothing in question. For uniforms this can mean their upper or lower body.
- Brute Damage
- Bruise - Patient was attacked with a blunt object. Ranges from tiny to monumental.
- Cut - Patient was attacked with a sharp object. Ranges from scabs to massive flesh wounds. High chance of bleeding.
- Puncture - Patient was likely shot. Ranges from punctures to gaping holes. High chance of bleeding.
- Burn Damage - Patient was burned, either from fire/freezing temperatures or electrocution. Ranges from skins to carbonized limbs.
- Bleeding
- Grabbing - Grab examines are done by grabbing someone and clicking on them with the grab in hand on help intent. You do not need to let go and grab again when switching which limb to examine.
- Wounds - Will inform you of any burns and bruises on the target limb. See above.
- Bones - Will inform you if the patient's limb is broken or not.
- Skin
- Unhealthy Discoloration - Patient has high toxins.
- Unusually Pale - Patient has moderate hypoxia.
- Decaying Limb - Patient's limb is necrotic.
Common Treatments
So we're past the quick guides and diagnostics, now it's time to elaborate on how medicine works inside the patient. The Guide to Chemistry may be a good page to visit to get a good idea of what each particular medicine can do.
Injections
This is the most common, quickest, and effective way to administer treatments to patients, involving medicine being injected straight into the bloodstream to be metabolized immediately at full effect. Injecting the patient is usually left unhindered unless they are wearing armor devoid of an injection port, something that voidsuits and hardsuits possess. Generally when you read about the effects of medicine, it's implied that those are the results you will get if you inject it into the patient. Note: Syringes spawn with a cap which keeps them uninfected. Using the same syringe over and over will increase the risk of infection and will pass viruses from one patient to the other. Use new ones! Hyposprays can be found in the medical doctor lockers in the medical sub-level. They act like syringes without the risk of causing infection upon re-use.
Pills
Pills are the second most common way to administer medicines, which are taken orally and metabolize at half effect in comparison to injection. Pills are mostly used for low-priority treatments or prescriptions, and are best shoved down the victim's throat whether they like it or not given to the patient along with instruction to swallow it. A patient wearing anything that covers the mouth will obviously be unable to take pills, making them unideal for patients in EVA gear.
Inhalation
Inhalers are a recent addition to the medical side of Aurora, and medicines from inhalers are obviously inhaled into the lungs. All medicines - save for a few such as Dexalin - are 3/4 as effective as injecting when inhaled, which is a quarter above pills at least. Autoinhalers found in aid kits come with 5u of Dexalin, but the contents can be removed/replaced by using a syringe on the inhaler. Non-expendable variants can be found in the CMO's office and in chemistry equipment lockers, along with small 15u cartridges that can be filled with whatever.
Topical Applications
This mostly applies to bandages and ointment, kits and equipment that you can use on a patient from the get-go. While we do not have medicinal patches, we do have trauma and burn kits for basic wound treatment, as well as for sealing bleeding and disinfecting wounds.
Your Organs!
All organs (the ones that were coded in anyway) serve some purpose, but it all boils down to "keep the brain alive". This section will describe what everything does and what may manifest if the organ in question is damaged. It should be noted that organs may be damaged if their respective limb/body part has fractures. All organs can be repaired with Peridaxon and surgical organ repair (sans the appendix), though certain medicines target specific organs.
Brain
The most important organ of all, it's the one that keeps you conscious, let alone interact with anything at all! So long as your brain is alive, you are alive.
- Function: Allows you to control your character and keeps you alive. If it dies, you die.
- Symptoms of Damage: Running into airlocks, brain traumas, sharp head pain.
- Causes of Damage: Impedrezine, Lung failure, heart failure
- Treatment: Alkysine, restoring bloodflow and supply via treating the heart, restoring blood oxygenization via treating the lungs. These are the primary cause of brain death. Keep the Heart and Lungs working.
Eyes
Lets you see and examine stuff.
- Function: Provides sight to the user.
- Symptoms of Damage: Blurry vision, no vision, sharp head pain, damaged/unresponsive pupils upon examination with a pen light.
- Causes of Damage: Welding without protection, phoron exposure, getting your eyes screwdriver'd or squished.
- Treatment: Oculine
Heart
The organ that keeps your blood flowing steady, allowing oxygen to distribute effectively. If this begins to fail, you'll start experiencing brain death. Keep it alive.
- Function: Keeps blood flowing, and regenerates lost blood.
- Symptoms of Damage: Hypoxia, blood loss, sharp chest pain, weak or high pulse rate upon examination with a stethoscope.
- Causes of Damage: Shock from injury, High pulse rate causing it to stop, lung injury, general organ attacks, certain brain traumas.
- Treatment: Adipemcina, organ Surgery, CPR to restart the heart
- Adrenaline is very potent for restarting the heart but requires a flow of Oxygen in the blood. When applying Adrenaline to a crisis patient, be sure to check their respiration.
Lungs
Lets you breathe! What do you breathe? That depends, but hopefully it's oxygen. Damage increases the amount of pressure of oxygen needed to sustain optimal oxygenation.
- Function: Provides oxygen to the blood stream.
- Symptoms of Damage: Hypoxia, gasping, sharp chest pain, weak respiration upon examination with a stethoscope.
- Causes of Damage: Lack of oxygen, over/under pressurized atmosphere, phoron exposure, general organ damage.
- Treatment: Peridaxon, organ Surgery, emergency reinflation via pen (In case of collapsed lung)
Kidneys
Filters your blood! Actually it does nothing, it's incredibly niche.
- Function: See above.
- Symptoms of Damage: Toxin damage if you
drinkinject coffee into your bloodstream. That's it. That's how niche this is. - Causes of Damage: General organ attacks.
- Treatment: Peridaxon
Liver
The biggest line of defense against poisons.
- Function: Reduces intoxication, prevents other organs from taking damage as long as it's still working.
- Symptoms of Damage: Vomiting, other organs taking damage from general toxins.
- Causes of Damage: High level of toxin damage, heavy alcoholic consumption.
- Treatment: Dylovene (at 10 liver damage and below)
Appendix
This serves no function other than to get sick and make you miserable.
- Function: See above.
- Symptoms of Damage: Pain, inflammation
- Causes of Damage: Appendicitis.
- Treatment: Surgical removal.
Races
Some races react a bit differently to medicine so it's important to become familiar with how some may fare. For the purpose of this section, Humans will be used as the base species for comparison. Subtypes will only mention differences in comparison to their parent species.
Human
- Normal brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Blood Volume: 560
- Primitive Form: Monkey
Skrell
- Normal brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Primitive Form: Neaera
- Less resistant to alcohol.
- Less stamina but faster running.
- Immune to slipping.
Unathi
- Slightly lower brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Primitive Form: Stok
- All Alcohol (Ethanol) is toxic.
- Can drink Butanol as an Alcohol (Ethanol) substitute.
- Less stamina but faster running.
- Slower walking speed.
Tajara
- Slightly higher brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Primitive Form: Farwa
- Less resistant to alcohol.
- Faster walking speed.
- Less stamina and running speed, but faster stamina recovery.
- Damage from falling is halved.
Zhan-Khazan
- Slightly higher brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Slower walking speed.
- Slower running speed, but more stamina.
- Resistant to cold.
- Tolerant to alcohol.
M'sai
- Significantly higher brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Faster walking speed.
- Faster running speed, but less stamina.
Dionaea
- Normal brute damage.
- Normal burn damage.
- Primitive Form: Diona Nymph
- Regenerates health and nutriment when in light or in radiation.
- Most reagents have little to no effect on a Diona.
- Plant-B-Gone severely poisons a Diona.
- Hyronalin deals toxins.
- Arithrazine deals major toxins.
- Cannot feel pain.
- Does not bleed.
- Immune to slipping.
- Immune to infections.
- Immune to decompression.
- Resistant to electrocution.
- Resistant to high temperatures.
- Breaks into nymphs upon death.
- Very slow movement speed.
Vaurca Worker
- Significantly lower brute damage.
- Significantly higher burn damage.
- Significantly higher toxin damage.
- Significantly lower Oxygen damage.
- Significantly lower Radiation damage.
- Primitive Form: V'krexi
- Breathes phoron.
- Possesses two hearts.
- Has an implant that stores phoron.
- Have other robotic implants.
- Has their own private Hivechat channel.
- Most surgeries require using the surgical drill instead of a scalpel.
- Can safely eat non-sterile K'ois.
- Normal food deals toxins.
- Immune to decompression.
- Immune to slipping.
- Resistant to alcohol.
- Slower walking speed.
- Slower running and less stamina recovery, but more stamina.
Vaurca Warrior
- Significantly lower brute damage.
- Slightly higher burn damage.
- Normal Oxygen damage.
- Significantly lower radiation damage.
- Normal walking speed.
- Faster running and more stamina.
Loadout
Improving the likelihood of a patient's survival depends not only on your medical knowledge but also on what's available to you, particularly medicines and equipment on your person. The following will go over an optimal loadout, though nothing is stopping you from experimenting; these are merely recommendations, and it may do well to inquire other experienced medical players as to what their loadout is.
Common Equipment
The equipment that most doctors have equipped:
- A medical HUD can evaluate someone's health from a glance, and even hide the health bar if their health is at 100%. Can also view patient records, allows you to set their physical status (useful for setting patients to SSD or deceased), and allows you to add comments to a patient's record.
- A medical belt to store your medicines. Has seven slots and is obviously worn around the belt slot.
- A bottle of Dylovene and Inaprovaline, as well as an empty bottle/beaker to mix the two into Tricordrazine in your belt. Additionally, if a Chemist is available, Bicaridine, KeloDerm/Dermaline, and Dexalin Plus are all important medicines to have.
- A syringe to extract said medicines. Holds 15u and draws/injects by 5u with each click. Can fit on your ear.
- Advanced trauma and burn kits to help with brute and burn wounds respectively, along with disinfecting them. Typically found in the advanced kit that you spawn with.
- A health analyzer for a more in-depth analysis of someone's health. Gives precise numbers as to someone's brute, burn, toxin, and oxy damage, and can even tell if someone has genetic, radiation, or brain damage, though not how much. Will also inform the user if the patient has fractures or internal bleeding, but not their location.
- A labcoat. Has storage space on the inside of the coat and allows you to use the suit storage slot.
- A pair of latex or nitrile gloves to prevent infection.
- A stasis bag to transport critical patients. These bags completely halt the progression of all damage, but they also deal genetic and oxy damage, meaning time is still of concern, and taking a patient out of the bag will crumple the bag up and make it useless.
- Webbing/drop pouches to store more items. Webbing and drop pouches are mechanically the same, the only difference being the name and sprite. Attaches to the uniform, found in the accessories section of the loadout tab in character setup.
- A stethoscope to diagnose heart and lung injuries. Attaches to the uniform.
- A roller bed to transport patients safely without dragging. Simply control click the bed, then clickdrag a patient onto the bed and you can start running without having to hunt for pixels to pull it. Can fit on the suit storage slot of the Rescue RIG.
Machinery
Medical has quite a few bits and pieces of stationary equipment to help with the workflow, most of which are elaborated on here:
Body Scanner
Pretty much a CT and MRI scanner shoved into one futuristic bed and console, and so much more! This is probably one of the most vital pieces of equipment for Medical as it can diagnose pretty much anything wrong with a patient. Some things it can do are, but not limited to:
- Provide information on all of the damage types.
- How much blood the patient has.
- Show what reagents are in the stomach/blood stream, and how much there is.
- Give a detailed analysis of each limb, including fractures, internal bleeding, the presence of implants, and if there are foreign bodies in the limb.
- Print condensed information to hand to a physician in the event the patient requires surgery. These should probably go into the filing cabinet behind reception.
Sleeper
Next are sleepers, beds that specialize in treating most side effects of trauma, but are otherwise an endless reservoir of some basic medicines. Some features of the sleeper are:
- Gives estimated readout of patient's health by means of number values and colored bar graphs.
- Allows the injection of:
- Dylovene
- Inaprovaline
- Soporific
- Perconol
- Dexalin
- Can conduct dialysis on a patient to remove anything that isn't blood (such as toxins, but medicines are included in this) from their blood stream.
Cryogenics
A true marvel of Medical are its cryogenic tubes, allowing the use of certain medicines that can only be used at sub-zero temperatures, namely Cryoxadone and Clonexadone, which are both capable of healing lots of damage over time. If not for healing genetic damage, it should be noted that one unit of medicine taken from the tube's beaker is multiplied into ten units inside the patient! It can also halt bleeding (including internal) and halt the symptoms/damage of infection.
How to Set Up
While a nice piece of equipment indeed, it requires some prep in order to use it to its full capacity, namely putting the beakers in and setting the gas cooler. Placing the beakers inside the cryo tube is as simple as taking the beakers on the table in hand and clicking on the tubes with them. As for the gas coolers, head to the freezer room, which is the room past the south-most door in the GTR. The coolers are on the north end of the room, just click on them and set the temperature between 10 and 80 Kelvin, though no lower or higher. Too low could draw a lot of unnecessary power, while setting it too high may slow down how fast the medicine inside the patient can work. Generally 63 Kelvin is the desired temperature.
Goodies From Departments
Medical has interactions with other departments besides just treating their injuries, surprisingly enough. Research can fabricate new tools and equipment, Cargo can order important medical stuff, and Security can hopefully restrain lunatics.
Research
Research can fabricate a number of nice tools for Medical, most of which will be described here:
Surgical
- Incision Management System (IMS): Requires high tier research and diamonds, but this tool is invaluable to have. One click can create an incision, clamp bleeders, and retract the skin at the same time!
- Laser Scalpel: Different versions depending on what's available to Research, but this basically works as a scalpel and hemostat combined when opening an incision.
Chemistry
- Bluespace Beaker: Requires diamonds but is immensely useful for chemistry, holding 300u as opposed to its non-bluespace counterpart which can only hold 120u.
- Cryostasis Beaker: Reagents won't mix or react inside this beaker, but it can only hold 60u. Not very useful outside of easier grenade production.
- Combat Inhaler: An inhaler capable of dumping all of the contents of a cartridge into the patient's lungs. Use with care!
- Large Inhaler Cartridge: 30u cartridge for inhalers. Double the capacity of the small cartridges that show up in chemistry.
- Bluespace Inhaler Cartridge: 60u cartridge, bigger is better obviously.
Quality of Life
- Super Capacity/Hyper Capacity Power Cells: Pretty much just the RIG benefits from a bigger cell, but hey, leg actuators are fun to use!
- Medibots: Either helpful, annoying, or totally useless. Swiping your ID over it will unlock its maintenance panel, allowing you to alter a few options. One option that should be turned on is to report treatments over HUD, while one option that should be turned off is the medibot's speaker as leaving it on will just let it fill up your chat log with nonsense. Probably the most important feature is allowing it to draw from a beaker that you can insert, allowing you to make custom mixes. Unfortunately the bot cannot tell the difference between any of the damage types, only treating a patient once their overall health reaches a certain threshold, therefore take care to not load in medicines that the patient can easily overdose on.
Upgrades
Cargo
Cargo's a bit down the hall but here's some medical stuff:
- Stasis Bags: Stasis bags are nice to have but there aren't many. In the event Medical is running low, it's always a good idea to order more.
- Surgical Tools: If you have to order this crate then something terrible has probably happened to the other tools.
Medical Department
| |
Head of Department | Chief Medical Officer |
Personnel | Physician - Surgeon - Psychologist - Pharmacist - Emergency Medical Technician - Medical Intern |
Useful Guides | Guide to Medicine - Guide to Surgery - Guide to Chemistry - Guide to Cadavers |