Sitting in the ER

No >:[

Hmmmm... that makes sense.

 

I've spoken about this before on the forums, but every time I hear a story like this it reminds me of my one and only visit to the hospital as an adult patient (of course I've been to many hospitals, many times, accompanying others). I went in with severe chest pain after enduring it while at work for nearly an hour in the hopes that it was an exaggerated bit of nothing that would shortly pass, and by the time I'd arrived to the E.R. I was in a critical state of physical agony and had to fight to avoid fainting.

The nurse had me wait in a room for close to 30 minutes before bringing me a single 5mg Vicodin and sending me (on foot) to the x-ray room. The doctor (who was from Africa, I could hardly understand him) told me that the x-ray revealed only minor swelling and gave me a prescription to 800mg Ibuprofen and sent me home. I had been treated as low class and understood that I was considered with suspicion a junkie by everyone (including the receptionist) and since it was midday, I had to walk the entire 5 miles home, in near 100deg weather, clutching my chest in pain and fighting back tears, out of breath already at the outset.

The next day I forced myself to go to work (I used to walk there, too) and very early after noon I received a phone call, this time from an Asian doctor, informing me that my x-ray had been again reviewed and this time revealed that my left lung had fully collapsed and that I needed to come back in immediately. I finished the work day because I was needed, and when I got to the hospital that evening I was immediately given an injection of 8mg Dialudid, and later on when I left, a prescription to a very high count prescription of Oxycontin (which I of course called-in to have refilled twice, heh heh). This was when I was (I think) 20 years old, and so although I was already an addict then, it was not *nearly* as bad as it would later become, and thus I felt offended by my treatment the day prior.

 

Wow! That's terrible, I'm so sorry that happened to you! Aside from having to wait what seemed like forever for a pain med, I have to say I was treated very well the entire time. I was carted around in a wheel chair, offered food/beverages, and the nurse stayed with me almost the entire time. It was actually kind of adorable how interested he was in seeing my many bruises, and hearing the stories behind them while we waited for the doctor to come in. All of the staff was very friendly and accommodating.

 

When I cut my finger off (about 1.5" of it) I sat in the waiting room for 2.5 hours with my finger in a. Zip lock bag and a dirty shop rag on the wound. When they saw me they gave me a shot of demerol, put my finger in a medical zip lock bag and told me to go to a hospital over an hour and a half away. Because they "aren't equipped to handle such things." I got to the other hospital and the same doctors that performed the first successful hand transplant reattached my finger.

One day my sister was doing a crafts project with her daughter. She had a pair of scissors in her hand, and when the dog jumped up onto the couch next to her he hit her hand and the scissors went about 4 inches into her neck. She pulled them out instinctively and went to the closest ER, where she waited over 3 hours to be seen. When they finally checked her out, they automatically told her to go across town to the trauma unit at the University Hospital. After they treated her there, the doctor asked her who she saw at the other hospital, and ran out of the room screaming about how he's gonna get people fired over this. Apparently the scissors came 2 mm away from puncturing her carotid artery. They told her that she's extremely lucky that she didn't bleed out in the waiting room of the first hospital.

I can only see shit like that getting worse with Obamacare.

 

Yikes!

 

Obvious pervert. Bet he posts on hip forums

 

Likely.

 

i tend to go to the hospital for actual emergencies

not to fill my need for drugs...actually i turn down the pain meds like someone else said earlier...i prefer knowing it hurts ..that way i dont hurt it more


there's too many people dying for me to waste the doctors/nurses time for a sprain

 

Yeah, well when you play a sport that is impossible to do without full function of your ankles, you'd want to go make sure everything was ok.

For the record, I went to a little urgent care clinic first, but it was too severe for them and got sent to the ER.

No need to be a dick about it.

 

Hope you get to feelin' better soon chicka. On the same sorta note I remember this one time I went to the dentist and realized that the numbing stuff wasn't working, but only after they started drilling Wonder if dentists are a kind of sadist sometimes man. Oh this guy's moaning a bit, let's keep going though. Ahh now I think he may be crying and oh wait, wait, wait, I think he's screaming too. Keep going..... Oh well at least your's was just a sprain.
Peace n' Love
IH

 

Glad you're on the mend MAMA. Get back on them-there skates and kick some ass!! Hope you can/will put some video up sometime so that we can witness the ass kicking.

 

After hearing of your emergency MAMA, I rushed to the computer and I will only make one post today and that post is:

Get well MAMA, with you hurt, the forum is just not the same. I am hoping they are treating you well. Good day

 

Thanks scratcho! I'm hoping to be on the roster by February.

Thanks Lorna.

 

get well Mama. get some early movement in, even if you're self-mobilizing with your hand. some soft-tissue (light massage) above and below the sprain is useful too

 

I think Mama was right to go to the hospital. It was a possibility that she had a fracture, in which case getting it into a caste soon is a good idea. There's also the non-zero possibility of complications.

If you want to turn down pain meds, that's certainly your prerogative. Pain meds are not to be taken casually, since there is a risk of addiction and other problems. It's probably a good idea for her to be taking pain meds though, since she might not otherwise be able to sleep, and since it is only on a short term basis. Honestly, if someone didn't take pain meds for something like this, it would sound to me like they would be trying to prove that they are a macho man rather than doing it for purely rational reasons.

Doctors and nurses in emergency and urgent care are at hospitals 24-7, whether there are patients to treat or not. I suspect that they didn't stop giving anyone CPR or other emergency care to treat Mama. If they thought anyone's case was a higher priority, they probably would have treated them first.

If she had a fracture and she made it worse by putting weight on it, or if it healed wrong and they had to re-break it, that probably would have taken more time and energy from the hospital staff.

If you would like to claim that it was ill-advised for Mama to go to the hospital, please provide a reference.

 

she mentions drugs in almost every post

pretty obvious why she went


thats my reference source

score !!!!

 

Awesome advice. Thanks .

Actually, I mention sex in almost every post. Even without your fancy mod powers, you should have been able to figure that out.
Either way, there's no reason for you to be an ass.

 

Also, thanks e7m8 for being an awesome dude.


(Although, I have taken pain killers casually on a few occasions, it's certainly nothing I make a habit out of.)

 

MAMA's ON DRUGS!

 

You weren't a'posed to get hurt on my birthday!