Any update for us, Jeff? We are all thinking of you.
Jeff, hope you can get a good result here, whatever’s going on.
:(
Finally got MRI at 3:00 in morning. Took 2 1/2 hours. Just fell asleep back in the ER isolation room and nurse comes in to say they didn’t see any changes so I needed to pack my stuff up and leave. No doctor, no one to talk to about what might be going on. My symptoms are now worse than when I went in. He gives me exit papers and tells me again to walk out to the waiting room. I point out that both my chart and the bright yellow bands on my arms explicitly say I’m a fall risk and not to walk. So he gets me a wheelchair and as I’m reading the discharge papers it says, “if you are experiencing these symptoms seek immediate medical attention or come back to the emergency room".
What’s on that list? I kid you not, every single thing I’m in there for at the very moment. I felt further humiliated when I saw what I was in emergency for: “muscle weakness”. I have muscle weakness my entire life thank you, and wouldn’t waste anyone’s time if I was just weak. No I’m in here because I nearly destroyed my car because part of my body stopped working altogether, which then happened the follow day at home as well. The neural pathway broke. That is not the same as being “weak”. It’s like they were just trying to clear out last nights hangers on and needed to have the room ready for the new days rush.
Made me feel like worthless trash and somewhat less than human.
That’s fucking insane. Like a hospital in Brazil. (the movie)
Holy shit, that is nuts Jeff. I am so sorry this is happening to you, I can only imagine how scary it is and how anxious you must feel.
Also, dude, if anything it is that hospital that is worthless trash. They sound like they are skirting the bounds of serious malpractice on a regular basis. If they sent you home like that and you fell in the parking lot or got into a wreck on the way home, any halfway decent attorney would have them over a barrel. Can you go to a different hospital that is less busy, maybe one out in the suburbs? Or, if your mobility issue allows, can you try to schedule a specialist appointment so they can do a more targeted diagnosis?
I talked to the CF clinic just now and they said go to the hospital’s other ER unless you’re about to die. That’s the only time they’d use this one.
Ugh that is fucking awful, jeff, I’m so sorry :(
How dumb is it that a hospital has two ERs???
Hang in there, Jeff. As I’m sure you know by now, wading through junk like this is part of the cost of healthcare…
-Tom
It’s a massive campus of multiple buildings spread all over the city. This is the primary campus part of the medical mile. But yea, 8 miles away is a second hospital they own with an ER there. And another one on the west part of town and like 20 other hospitals in this part of the state. We have 6 very large urgent care centers here as well.
Normally Spectrum Health is amazing. I love them. But it’s such a roll of the dice when you need emergency care whether you get people who care and want to help vs. those who just can’t be bothered or appear to actively despise the fact you need their help.
I should qualify this a bit to not be unfair to them. They have literally saved my life several times in that ER from my pulmonary complications.
But they have also made me want to kill myself as well and made me feel like dirt. When I’d have to go in with pancreatitis, because mine is so messed up, tests don’t always come back as textbooks indicate. So sometimes ER docs understood CF and long term pancreatitis from childhood doesn’t present very typically. In one visit they started giving me pain meds to take the edge off knowing I’d need a 2-week hospital admission. Shift changed and the next ER doctor came on and told me I was a pathetic dime a dozen drug addict and he was kicking me out of ER because he didn’t believe me. I begged him to look at my history, talk to the clinic about this, but no - he knew better. So I’m crying as I’m wrapped up in a ball being taken away treated like a common heroine addict off the street. Thankfully someone got through to the CF team who had to argue like mad with him that I wasn’t your normal case. Children just don’t get pancreatitis that becomes a lifelong problem. But her made up his mind the moment he saw me and evidence and data was not gonna to sway him (kinda like trumpers)
But this didn’t happen just once. Care all too often was either amazing with wonderful and the most caring staff, or the polar opposite where you feel like you are begging for your life.
Yesterday/today felt like that again. The first ER doc I had was super. Very intelligent. Asked the most poignant questions, exceedingly thorough and patient. My Mom and I both commented on how awesome he was. Shift change. Next ER doc literally wouldn’t let me finish a single sentence, half-assed a partial exam, and took off while I was still trying to tell him the full history. And that was the last time I saw a doc.
I’m fascinated to know how a hospital can have a mix of both assholes and angels? Who does the hiring? A monkey with a dartboard?
In my experience, it’s just how it is.
Granted, all the experience is working in a single not-for-profit enterprise + university combination, but spread across 6 different cities and many hospitals, family medicine and specialty clinics, etc.
(ETA: clarified I’m talking about ostensible co-workers :-) )
It is. It’s a literal roll of the dice. It seems like I’m more nervous about what kind of doctor I’m going to get vs. the critical medicine I’m going to need.
It’s easy for some doctors to forget how vulnerable patients are psychologically when everything depends on said individual who’s responsible for your care.
And I understand they get frustrated with drug and alcohol addicts or serial ER abusers, but if you’re going to make snap judgements about patients, you should get it right. I’m not the guy with the “suck me” subway t-shirt.
Jeff, if I could I’d jump in the jet and come over to ve your wingman. You shouldn’t be alone through thia godawful sea of shit. Hang in there buddy!
Though I’m disappointed in how things things were handled this morning, I remember the hell hospital staff have been through due to covid and wonder if I’m being unfair.
No you’re not. You’re also being compassionate even though you just have been through several levels of sheer fucking hell. Demonstrating that it can be done, and in the medical profession ought to be done.
You don’t happen to have Job for a middle name, do you?
I agree with @schurem. You aren’t being unfair. Your desire to be treated as an individual isn’t unreasonable (even without your medical history).
My dad almost died some years back from sepsis. He seemed ok at the time except red, swollen, elbow after a cut on his arm. The ER doc ordered bloodwork which came back fairly normal. If my uncle, who was a great ID doc we could have used during this pandemic) hasn’t convinced the guy to order a differential white count, they would have sent him home and within a couple of hours it would have been too late to save him.
Doctors, even great doctors, aren’t infallible. But sometimes they forget that they are human like the rest of us.
At any rate, sorry you have had such a rough go of it. Hope they figure out what the heck is going on.
Some day I will laugh that the list of discharge symptoms that required “immediate medical attention”, are the ones they sent me home with. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
What I never understood is why shifts at hospitals seem so long. Studies have shown that long shifts lead to greater mistakes, and they were originally designed by a guy that enjoyed using cocaine.
While you’ll never be able to know if it’s the fault of any one particular person to be angry at, you’re not being unfair by feeling ignored. It wouldn’t be resource impossible to actually listen instead of following a script to maximize profit/reduce waste.