This remarkable health journey that my husband, Allyen, our kids and I embarked on earlier this year together has taught me some important lessons already. One is that just like home remodeling snowballs into something bigger (e.g., repair the toilet becomes take-the-bathroom-down-to-the-studs), health crises happen the same way just faster.
This is what happened to Allyen. Without warning, a blood clot formed in his leg, broke off, traveled up to and through the heart, coming to rest at the juncture that feeds the lungs. He couldn’t breath, but what happened next was actually far more dangerous. Without the breath and therefore the oxygen, his heart stopped.
When your heart stops, and during the necessary CPR, the brain is deprived of the important oxygen it needs to survive. It doesn’t take long for damage to occur. It was a cascade of physical crisis.
Ensuing problems such as kidney failure, lung problems, etc., can often be addressed and resolved over time. But what happens to the brain becomes the long-term issue for recovery. It’s called an anoxic brain injury.
I read a medical study from April 2011 that indicated that just 3% – 7% of those suffering brain injury after resuscitation from cardiac arrest return to their previous level of functioning.
The initial physical cascade happens without you really being aware. Then, there is the physical cascade in the early days following: kidneys get unhappy; new medications are introduced; lungs struggle to repair. You start looking at every little number on the monitors and in the labs. It is a cascade of information and, for someone not medically trained, its tough to know what is important.
The communication cascade also begins immediately with friends and family. Calls generate more calls. Facebook  frankly saved me on this one. Sorry to those not connected I reserve my Facebook for family and close friends but it was the easiest way for me to work through this part of the cascade. My messengers  kept my wider network and Allyen’s network apprised.
So, where did we land in the neurological part of the physical cascade? We sort of lucked out. Allyen’s memory is sound and cognitively he lost remarkable little function. He’s performing below the amazingly high level he was before, but still so high the docs have had difficulty measuring him. He’ll always be above average!
What is still fighting him is his body; but even this constantly improves. He’s even doing ballroom dancing lessons!
Lessons for the communicator
Now that I’m back to work, and really digging into a new client’s intranet, I’m seeing a cascade of information in a whole different context. In my user research with them, there is a constant expression of exasperation with email use. It’s used to secure approvals, changes to documents, major decisions, and idea generation. Round and round they go with the emails, many with attached documents. Errors are made, people are missed, changes and decisions not captured.
One executive told me he handles as many as 600 new emails every day. How can he possibly be expected to deliver quality leadership, strategy, attention and decision making?
If you aren’t already on a crusade to limit this ineffective information cascade, you should be. I know I am!
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