There were 50+ patients waiting for beds in the hospital. We were seated in the hallway
******
That was the start of Friday's post, written Thursday afternoon, on my phone, still in the hallway. the patient no longer seated but able to lie down on a stretcher in a screen-divided, open to all passersby cubby.
Sir, are you living outside?
The strong smell of urine as the bedraggled man struggled by us on his way to the restroom; and the lengthy clean up afterwards.
The EMT's from car accidents all over the county and beyond. The Yuma EMT who explained their four hour drive to his gurney riding patient this way: The nearer hospitals are closing departments and now not all of them have everything you might need. But this is a University hospital and they have all the bells and whistles. So, here we are.
Nurses doing yeoman's work on twelve and a half hour shifts, with a 30 minute lunch break.... unless it's overwhelmingly busy. We felt well tended. It took only a bit of my pushy personality to find TBG a place to lie down and at least pretend to be comfortable. His needs were met almost instantaneously, since he was open to all the action and all the actors all the time.
This isn't how it should be.
The uninsured are once again showing up at hospitals instead of clinics. The underfed and untreated are not turned away.
Instead, our Medicare Advantage plans went up 30 and 40 percent, respectively. No one in the hospital, from the cashier in the cafeteria to the hospitalist who solved TBG's problem, received a thirty or forty percent bump in their salary.
This isn't how it should be.
The bill from his last hospitalization was $121,239.50. We have insurance that covered it all. It's easy to see how the uninsured are one kidney stone away from bankruptcy.
This isn't how it should be.
All true. Terry had to be in the ER two summers ago due to a heart issue that was caught while he was at cardiac rehab.
ReplyDeleteHis cardiologist's office is on the same grounds as the hospital where he does cardiac rehab so they wheel-chaired him over there. The cardiologist sent him right back to the ER in the hospital BUT because the cardiologist is a prime entity in that hospital, a bay was found for Terry as well as two other of the cardiologist's patients.
Terry was kept overnight, in the cardiac wing, and had an ablation. He also had a private room. In talking with his nurse, the next day, I mentioned what we had seen in the ER, just what you described, and how quickly things moved for Terry. Yes, she said, the doctor and the insurance made all the difference. There are too many elderly sick people in our area, and too many do not have the doctors and the insurance to open those doors and move things along. How much longer can the system even pretend to "hold."
White people with insurance and brains and access to lawyers (how many releases we signed!) do seem to receive better treatment, but that's another post entirely.
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The medical system makes me angry.
ReplyDeleteMe, too.
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I guess I had no idea it was that bad. In my Keiser HMO everything seems a little slow sometimes, but calm and efficient and patients are well treated and treated well. Copays are small, with otherwise full coverage.
ReplyDeleteWe were never offered a Keiser plan, but a doctor friend in Marin worked there and often spoke of the ease of moving through their system. Of course, that was 20 years and more ago,
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