Hope you get some rest soon! Thank you for the awesome work you do everyday!!

I was in hospital as a patient for 7 weeks and I still feel the need to say thank you to anyone in the medical field for doing all that you do to take care of us as patients - I hope you are looked after as well as I was, and THANK YOU for doing an amazing job!

Now you get to be treated by your equally sleep deprived colleagues. That sounds like fun, but at least you'll be rested and can honestly call in sick for the next few shifts.

What I'm more concerned with is that you experience this consequence after 30 hours of no rest, and will more than likely be treated by doctors who have had 30+ hours of no rest as well, perhaps causing a trend. So I'm going with #8 here. I'd rather have a well-rested medical staff than an exhausted, barely functioning one. Makes no sense to overwork the doctors/nurses as such.

Well, did you die? ..But seriously.. FYL, OP. Nobody should have to work that long. It's dangerous, as shown by the FML, and I wouldn't want to have surgery or anything preformed on me, or anyone, really, by a sleep-deprived doctor, anyway.

You have my sympathies OP, I hope you are feeling better now. I worked quite a few double shifts that ended up bring over 18 hours long. One double shift I became quite ill myself (I have Crohn's), and knowing that something similar might happen to me if I tried to go home, I walked straight down into Emergency where I was admitted. I needed a blood transfusion and due to lack of beds I was admitted back onto the ward I had just come off. I had delivered my roommates baby earlier in the night. I kept in contact with her until I moved, she said it's the only time she had heard of the staff being in more pain than the mother during a birth. For an example of how a 30 hrs with out sleep happened to me, first off the day starts as normal, I was up at 6am for an appointment out of town and then started work at 3pm. Staff call in sick for night duty (10 hrs long) then something happens in the morning keeping you at the hospital for another couple of hours, boom, 30 hours without sleep. Normally the ward managed with 4 to 7 staff, and midwives are hard to come by anywhere let alone out in the outback, so there wasn't a large pool of extra staff to cover sick staff. Then the staff get sick from overwork and the cycle continues. After one afternoon and hellish night shift, we had a very sick baby born that required ventilation. This is a rural hospital and not set up for babies needing that level of care long term. We had an old ventilator that was tricky to use, and only 3 staff really knew how to use it. We finally get the baby stable and are just waiting for the NETS (Newborn Emergency Transport Service) to arrive and take over. Just as we are told they will be there in approximately 3 hours, the ventilator breaks down. I hand ventilated the baby for 3 hours until NETS arrived. I have never been so pleased to see anyone in my life. Lucky squeezing the bag was light work, and I had other staff handing me drinks, food, talking to me. We tried to get one of the other midwives in who had experience with that level of care but we couldn't get in contact with them. It's something you don't expect in a hospital that only has 50 births a month. Baby made it through without any long term problems. I was going to tell another story about a baby resuscitation but I've rambled on for too long.

It's a good think you didn't manage to get into your car and try to drive at that stage of exhaustion. Hope you feel better soon, OP.

And this, ladies, gents, and variations thereupon, is someone who definitely could have been treating you if you've ever been to a hospital. Docs and nurses, from my understanding, regularly pull shifts that are entirely too long for people who are saving lives.

I'd be questioning whoever sets up the shift scheduling and has someone work to the point that they collapse from exhaustion.

I hope you have a quick recovery and get some much needed rest