Day 3 cont’d.: March 22, 2013
I am tired and lying in bed, but feeling hopeful now that my husband has been admitted to hospital and has a real bed (not on an emerg gurney) and nurses to document his pain and look after him. I hear the familiar beep alerting me to a text message. It’s probably just one of many people who’ve been texting me to find out how we’re doing, I think, but then again, it could be my husband, and it is. He says he’s been moved to another room. I text back, Good night. Get a restful sleep. I turn out the lights and fall to sleep, physically and mentally exhausted.
Day 4: March 23, 2013
I bolt out of bed at 7:00 a.m. I instinctively know I have to call my husband. I dial and he picks up. He’s agitated. I can almost hear him pacing the floor. I almost took a taxi home after they woke me up and moved me here, he says. I ask about the room and my even-tempered husband rants: There’s no running water! There’s no bathroom! He says he was told he can’t use any nearby patient rooms because of infection transmission to or from him.
This is a huge problem. Someone with his severe GI issues, who sometimes gets less than a moment’s notice from his body to find the washroom, must get out of bed and, moving slowly, due to fatigue and pain, walk down a long hall, past the nurses’ desk, around the corner and use the public washroom. And he is susceptible to infection because he doesn’t have any white blood cell regeneration, but he has to use a public washroom?
Then, he adds, there is no call bell – just a concierge bell (ding) that can’t be heard down the long hall where the nurses’ station is located.
I need to get out of here, he tells me. You have to come and see this. I can’t stay here.
I try to be calm and rational, telling him I will get this sorted out but I’m absolutely hysterical inside. I hang up the phone and fall apart. I walk in circles trying to figure out what to do. I pick up the phone and call my brother-in-law, a retired public-school principal. He has a great sense of humour but if push comes to shove his presence and calm demeanor, stating the facts in an even-toned authoritative way, has people jumping quickly.
In between my sobs I apologize, then quickly assure him that we are both o.k. so he won’t worry (he knows the situation and has been visiting us in hospital). I explain that I’d go there but no one will take a blubbering, hysterical wife seriously so I will do more harm than good. He says he’ll be at the hospital in a few minutes.
I know I have to calm down and get to the hospital but I’m having trouble focusing. How much more can he take? How much more can I take? When will this nightmare end?
I call my step-daughter (I have promised to keep her in the loop, but have warned her this is a very scary ride; she has assured me she plans to ride it out with us and has kept that promise). She says she will meet her uncle at the hospital and tells me to call my neighbour to help me calm down. I call her and she runs over. She is looking for things to do to help but I just need someone to talk me down from hysteria. She suggests that we contact our daughter, who lives out of town (a 90-minute drive away) to see if she can come stay with me for a few days.
Though I’m reluctant to tell all my children about every detail, because it changes from minute to hour and back again, my typical day now isn’t so typical anymore. I am not eating. Despite the fact that the clock has stopped ticking for me, that every day is one unpredictable rollercoaster ride, the realities of life still exist. I come home every night exhausted from the hospital and deal with paying bills, doing laundry so my husband can have clean PJs and trying to do the bare minimum to keep up with life’s demands. Then I shower and drop into bed and fall asleep. I am back at the hospital the next day. It’s a vicious circle and I’m getting worn down. Soon I will be as sick as the health care system that is hemorrhaging uncontrollably.
I call my stepdaughter. She is heading into the hospital. I tell her about my neighbour’s suggestion to call our daughter. I ask if she can do it because I can’t think straight.
My neighbour has managed to talk me down. I am more clear headed. She leaves. My brother-in-law calls and chuckles saying, we have a plan. This becomes our code joke in the days that follow. He has spoken to the nurses and, in his very calm and measured tone states, these are the facts: no washroom, etc. – and if we don’t deal with it you will have to deal with his wife who is really upset. The doctors are paged. He states the facts again and asks, would you agree this isn’t the ideal setup for someone this sick? They concur.
The head of the team asks the nurse, how do we get him a new room? And that, right there, tells us again just how sick our healthcare system is. A doctor, who once had the authority to decide what is in the best interest of his patients, must now wade through the bureaucracy that is part of a broken health care system just to find a very sick man a decent bed in a hospital.
I arrive at hospital and my brother-in-law says, the plan has fallen apart. I feel my heart drop through the floor. He then assures me a room will be found, but not by 12 noon as originally promised. He has to go. I thank him, many times, then sit with my step daughter and my husband, who is now calmer, dozing in the bed. Soon after our daughter arrives.
A nurse comes in and asks if I have spoken to the coordinator. I ask who that is. That’s who I go to if I have problems, she tells me, though doesn’t elaborate about the role of this mystery person but I agree. Is there really someone there who will help me advocate?
Soon after a woman arrives and introduces herself, saying she’s the weekend coordinator and I recount our story. She is sympathetic and agrees this isn’t the ideal situation for a patient like my husband. And I quickly realize that we are the unwitting hostages, yet again, in this broken medical care system.
We don’t have enough rooms for all the patients, she tells me. In my husband’s case he was put in a ward for heart surgery patients. That’s where I left him. But an emergency post-op needed the bed so they moved him.
We usually use this room for people who will be discharged next day or palliative care where family needs a private area to say goodbye to a loved one, she tells me. This was probably the only room available when they had to move my husband.
She explains this makeshift room – a meeting room with a blackboard and TV, plus the hospital bed and temporary privacy dividers – is not considered a patient room by the government so the tab for patient stays and care in rooms like this – and there are more – come out of the hospital’s budget. She agrees this is a Band-Aid solution but at least he’s in hospital. They are waiting for a private room just a few steps away, slated to be vacated at 5:00 and cleaned by 6:00 p.m.
She hands me a pamphlet entitled Patient Relations. I immediately notice that one of the Patient Relations Specialists (PRS) listed is someone I know from my early days when I first started freelance writing. The brochure talks about services for ‘families and caregivers’ in the local hospital system (see below for the seven areas handled by the PRS). I wonder why everyone isn’t given this when they are admitted to hospital. I also find out that the coordinators are on every hospital floor. Their job includes overseeing staff issues that come from staff themselves and from patients and their families.
Maybe there is a way to maneuver through this system, I think. Then I wonder what do other families do to advocate for their loved ones? I feel like that’s all I do right now. If I didn’t have family to help me to advocate for my husband I would be on my own. If he didn’t have me he’d be on his own.
At 6:00 p.m., as promised, we are moved into a private room with running water, a toilet and a real call button.
I am emotionally and physically exhausted but hopeful; still I ask the nurses several times if he will be moved and they assure me this will be his room. I go home and pour myself a glass of wine. Forget what mom said about not drinking alone. I won’t sleep unless I stay calm and I need my sleep to continue to be strong. Tomorrow is another day and I have no idea what new adventures await us…
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Patient Relations Specialist (PRS)
[HOSPITAL SYSTEM NAME] is committed to learning and improving upon our health care service with the input we receive from our patients, families and visitors. The PRS offers patients, families and caregivers the following services…
- Addressing Concerns – in a supportive and respectful environment. Follow up on concerns so that management, physicians and staff are aware of issues and can address them in an appropriate manner.
- Facilitating Communication – between patients, family and appropriate members of the health care team.
- Answering Questions – relating to services, policies and procedures.
- Listening to Comments.
- Implementing Suggestions – that serve to improve the services, policies and procedures.
- Investigating Issues: with the intent to review and investigate all relevant issues, facilitate communication and resolve conflict.
- Receiving Compliments – with the promise to share these with all members of the health care team.