Another day another galleon
The rest of his morning went rather quickly. His latter two cases were both wizards with dragon pox, in addition to muggle chicken pox. Calamine lotion had both patients on their way home. When Draco sat down in the cafeteria, he was eager to open Mrs. Watkins labs. Before he could do so, Theo sat down across from him.
“I was pleasantly surprised by my patients this morning,” Theo said as he opened his salad. “The first one was a werewolf, of course. The full moon was yesterday, so that wasn’t a shocker. However, the second two were people that were both attacked by merpeople! There wasn’t really anything I would do for them, but at least it made for an interesting morning”.
“Why were they sent to you?” Draco was barely listening as he scanned over the blood work.
“I’m not really sure. Merpeople aren’t venomous. Technically they’re a species instead of a disease. I’m thinking the primary healers got confused on my job description”.
Draco didn’t reply. His brain was working in overdrive staring at the numbers in front of him. He blinked a few times to see if it would change them.
“Yoo-hoo!! Earth to planet Draco! What has your face looking like you’ve just seen a niffler do a strip tease?” Theo got up and came around the table to see what Draco was looking at. He gave a low whistle. “White blood cell 3. Hemoglobin 7. Platelets 67. Even the liver numbers are terrible! Who is this person? This is a chronic patient right?”
Draco shook his head. “No. This is a young witch that WALKED in this morning. Headache and magical fatigue. I assumed it was migraines due to exhaustion from spreading herself too thin, but now I’m not so sure”.
“She hasn’t had any run-ins with a vampire recently has she? That would explain the anemia, thrombocytopenia, and the fatigue”. Theo stabbed a cherry tomato with his fork while he thought. “It’s out of my scope but I’ve also heard of prolonged dreamless sleep causing neutropenia”.
“No to both of those. She’s just an average young witch. Husband, kid, job, you know the drill. She didn’t mention anything that could cause this. My diagnostic spell was clean. I have no idea what’s going on. I need to send an owl”. With that, Draco abruptly stood up and walked out. He hurried to the owlery, and quickly jotted down his concerns. His letter asked Mrs. Watkins to come back in at her earliest convenience to recheck her labs, but in the meantime, to avoid any dangerous activities that could lead to bruising or bleeding. He also advised her to take a blood replenishing potion. Satisfied, he set off towards the inpatient ward for his rounds.
There were 5 patients on his service today. 2 had pneumonia, both from misfired spells. Another had third degree burns from a misused warming charm. The last two were having blood sugar issues, caused excessive use of dittany. Very few witches or wizards knew that dittany leached glucose from your body, these gentlemen included. They had shown improvement, however, and Draco was able to discharge both home.
Draco sat at his desk, exhausted. It was only 3 in the afternoon, but the amount of paperwork he had to do made him weary. He worked in reverse, settling the books for the inpatient ward, and then moving onto the clinic. The complicated poxes were easy to complete, and all that left him with was Mrs. Watkins. He found himself staring at her lab values again, trying to make it make sense. He started writing a synopsis-
“A. Watkins. 31 year old female. No health history other than uneventful birth 3 years prior. Seen today for complaints of fatigue, decreased magical reserve, and headache x6 weeks. Nothing of note triggers the event. Advanced diagnostic shows no areas of issue. Lab work drawn today shows gross pancytopenia. Scheduled redraw for when patient is available. Chemistry panel is still pending. Plan is to reevaluate patient mid episode. No current hypothesis on ailment.”
Something nagged at his brain, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. He felt like he was missing something huge, but no matter what he did, he couldn’t see it. Irritated, he got up in a huff. He packed his things, said a hurried goodbye to Theo, and apparated to his flat. There was no point in worrying over something that was hopefully an error in labs.