Many people on this board and elsewhere have suggested writing letters to the hospital and politicians about the way my parent was treated in the ER and the medical floor. Well, no amount of apologizing, increased funding, increased nursing staff, or after-the-fact "improvements" will ever change the needless misery inflicted on us by the ER nurses and those on the medical unit who failed to answer call lights, provide information or emotional support, or delivery trays on time.
It is my mother who served as Nurse in the military during WWII and was in perfect health until 2 years ago. Unlike nurses today, nurses serving overseas in wartime worked extremely hard and did not have luxuries such as heated/air conditioned hospitals or a full contingent of security guards and police officers to step in at a moment's notice if a patient got unruly. Nurses serving in WWII and Viet Nam were often totally on their own and subject to grave dangers that nurses today can only imagine.
One resident and the medical student who took care of my mother spent a great deal of time listening to her and learning about her experiences during WWII. I was moved to tears when the resident actually THANKED her and said, "We should all be grateful to people like you." At least he and the medical student showed respect and compassion.
In contrast, when my mother arrived in the ER on a stretcher in agonizing pain, the cruel triage nurse immediately insisted she get off the stretcher and sit upright in a wheelchair! I tried to explain nicely that she was in terrible pain and needed to lie down even though there was a wait, but that nurse was devoid of humanity and insisted my mother get off the stretcher and sit up in a wheelchair in the waiting room. We waited 2 hours to be taken back and a total of 6 hours for pain & nausea medication.
Instead of showing such heartless cruelty to an elderly Veteran who risked her life serving her country and who had used minimal health resources until 2 years ago, those ER nurses should have showed some respect and appreciation.
For those who insist that ER nurses don't have time to ask patients if they are Veterans or the underlying cause of their illness, it takes all of 10 seconds to ask, "Are you a Veteran of a foreign War?"
It would be poetic justice if the ER nurses and those others who failed to show appreciation and compassion were struck down by an equally painful, debilitating disease, forced to sit bolt upright in a wheelchair for hours, and deprived of pain and nausea medicine for 6 hours. Then maybe they would get a taste of their own medicine and justice would be served.
