The last few days have been stressful, to say the least. Yesterday, I ended up in the emergency room for 9 hours. I had fallen 11 days prior, and was fine for a week, but then my right chest started hurting really badly. It got so bad Sunday, that I decided that if it wasn't better by Monday, I would go to the doctor. So I woke up Monday morning, and could barely straighten up without intense pain stabbling through my chest. I made it to the kitchen, took some OTC pain meds, got a cup of tea, and went back to call the Dr's office. Turns out, my doctor decided to take this week off. I'm praying he isn't one of the stupid people who is having a huge Thanksgiving family gathering, but it's always possible. To top it all off, no one else was available. They wanted to set me up on a televisit with a nurse practitioner, but I decided to just go to the ER instead.
My friend who usually drives me to my appointments was not available, so I called an ambulance. They were very nice, as well they should be, since ambulances charge $500+ to take you 5 miles to the hospital. Then, they don't file claims with insurance, so you have to do all that yourself, and fight with Medicare and Medicaid to get it paid. Being old is so much fun. 😒
Got there, and it was a madhouse. They stuck me in a corridor and literally forgot about me. After 2 hours, I grabbed a nurse who was walking by and asked to go to the bathroom. She said "Who's your nurse?" I said I didn't know, and she said she'd find out. She evidently didn't find out, because nobody ever came. She walked back by about half an hour later, and asked if my nurse had come, and I said no, so she took me to the bathroom, and said I could just go by myself from now on, since I was ambulatory.
About an hour later, I asked someone for water, and again, they asked "Who's your nurse?" I again said "I don't know, " so they looked it up on the computer and said "I'll go get her." My thought was that it would have taken less time to just go get me some freaking water. I didn't get the water, so I grabbed someone else about 30 minutes later, and he had to ask if I could have water. Luckily, a nurse standing right there nodded her head, and he got me a small glass of ice and water.
After 4 hours of being completely ignored, I decided I had to take drastic measures, so I went to the information desk, told them the pain in my chest was getting worse and I had a horrible headache, and I really needed to see a doctor or even my nurse. Again "Who's your nurse?" I answered with tears (of anger, not pain, but they didn't need to know that...right?) "I have no idea! Nobody will tell me who she is, and I haven't seen her once since I've been here." The male nurse said he would go get a doctor right away, and he was there within ten minutes, ordered me some tylenol and ibuprofen and ordered all sorts of tests. For the next couple of hours, I had blood drawn, a gazillion x-rays, an ekg, more blood drawn, and another ekg.
After this flurry of activity, I finally saw my nurse. She must have been "spoken to," because she turned my bed around so she could see me, which was a ridiculous statement, since her sight was blocked by a supplies cabinet. This women was not all together, I'm telling you. Then she disappeared I finally asked someone if I could have something to eat, not having eaten since 7 a.m., and she said she was going to go ask the doctor. She came back by with sandwiches, but didn't even look at me. A few minutes later, I saw my nurse again, so I asked her if I could have something to eat, and told her I had asked someone before, but they never came back to me. My nurse spotted the doctor and asked if I could eat, but then she just walked off. The other nurse (NOT my nurse) came over and asked if I would like a ham or turkey sandwich and a gatorade, and about 10 minutes later, she brought it to me. I never did see my nurse again, and don't know her name to this day.
Finally, when the shift changed, someone came and moved me. He wasn't my nurse, but my new nurse did actually show up and talk to me this time, and wanted to take more blood for some heart enzyme test they had given me that had to be taken every 3 hours. I had no idea why they were testing my heart, so I said NO to the test, said I wanted to go home, and he went to find the doctor.
A few minutes later, a resident and her student helper also showed up, and a few minutes later a doctor showed up. He said "I hear you want to go home." I asked why my heart was being tested, and he said the doctor who ordered the test was acting on with an abundance of caution, and he works on an abundance of common sense. He said he didn't think I needed the test, that he thought it was a strained muscle, and he was going to release me. Oh Happy Day!
I called my friend who agreed to come pick me up.. I also called my younger son, who I'd been talking to off and on through the ordeal. He always cheers me up immensely, so by the time my paperwork was done, I was smiling and feeling glad the ordeal was over.
If I have a choice, I will never go back to that hospital ER again. It's a very good hospital, and I don't know what their excuse is for being so slack is, but next time, I'll ask to go to the other hospital in town. I hear it treats people much better.
Oh - I forgot. The one person I did see was the lab tech who came by to give me a COVID test. She said as soon as they got the negative results back, they'd move me into a room. That never happened, and when I was leaving, 8 hours later, my nurse told me that they hadn't processed it yet.
I kept my mask on the entire time, and I hope that was enough to save me from contracting COVID. I got notification this morning that my test came back negative, so I'm crossing my fingers.
Anyway, I didn't use social media or watch TV on day 3, obviously, but I wish I had just taken the tele-viisit with the nurse-practitioner, gone down to their lab and gotten my x-rays and gotten home in a couple of hours. Lessons learned.
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