Dear Editor:
Last weekend I was in Gilroy at the local hospital and while I
was in the waiting room of the emergency room there, I happened
upon your newspaper.
Dear Editor:
Last weekend I was in Gilroy at the local hospital and while I was in the waiting room of the emergency room there, I happened upon your newspaper. I came across a column by a woman named Kat and it coincidentally was about her experience at the very hospital I was in.
As a healthcare worker myself (for another institution), I was flabbergasted that this woman wrote a long rant describing her disappointment that a busy emergency room didn’t meet up to her fantasies of Dr. Green’s ER program on television. Somehow this is St Louise’s fault that the staff, the building, the beds, the gown – didn’t meet her TV dream of care? Is it fair to slander (without the information to do so) a hardworking group of professionals who have chosen to give up nights, weekends and holidays to care for patients such as herself?
Let me try to give her the cluephone here. First of all, emergency rooms at 2 a.m. are LOCKED. I don’t know where she comes from, but here in California they are. It’s called KEEPING THE PATIENTS AND STAFF SAFE FROM HARM. Hello Kat? She must not get out much, or worse, she calls herself a “writer” but does no research before she spews her venom. It is completely appropriate to be “buzzed in” to an emergency room at such a late hour. Unless you arrive code 3 with lights and sirens blaring, you can count on some sort of question when you arrive unannounced, in the wee hours. Especially out in a secluded area. Would an armed guard be more welcoming?
Apparently this is lost on the sophisticated Kat.
Second thing. Vague complaints of chest pain and rapidly beating heart on a rather large woman (I saw her picture in your paper). By her own description, she was monitored appropriately. Pulling off wires to go pee doesn’t give a “flatline,” it gives a “disconnection.” Once again though, your paper chose to print a fantasy that paints the ER staff of St Louise as asleep at the wheel because they didn’t drop the ball on more critical patients and stampede her when she took it upon herself to discontinue the monitors and go the bathroom. I’d like to know if she pressed her call light and did she not realize there were probably more critical patients than she and that the nurses perhaps had their hands full at that particular moment in time? This kind of ignorance promoted in your paper doesn’t give you much credibility.
So she was apparently evaluated, monitored and released. No harm to her, but she chose to trash the staff and the facility based on zero knowledge of how healthcare operates (except what she watched on the TV!) Yet she complains. I’d like to invite her to visit an emergency room that isn’t on par with St. Louise, then maybe she would have something to whine about. St. Louise’s professional staff, technicians and management are all top notch, and your paper would do well to promote, rather than degrade the good thing you are fortunate enough to have at your fingertips 24-7. Count your blessings people.
Have you any idea the hours of continuing education hospital staff must acquire per year? Do you know how many charities not only the hospital supports, but that the STAFF support all on their own, in their own time? How many hands held, children comforted, mother’s reassured? Lives saved? But yet for the sake of a quickie ride on the chuckle train, you degrade the best thing in town. Based on one woman’s fantasy she watches on the boob tube. I think you owe the hospital an apology.
They will be there for you when your heart attack or other awful disaster comes. They will forget the mean letter and they will work to save you or stabilize you. They will be professional, and they will do their best despite the things you choose to print.
No, they may not give you a full length chenille robe to wrap up in while you lay on the gurney. No, they may have their hands full when you ring the bell, and they may have to make you wait a minute while they help an old lady into a wheelchair, or perform CPR on somebody’s Dad. They are doing the best they can, and we should be grateful, not spiteful.
We should be more generous to these individuals and give them a break. Next time you visit the emergency room, OBSERVE, don’t make snap judgments. There are things going on that are not only complex, but downright miraculous! Thank you St Louise for being there for all of us!
April Manns, Fremont
Submitted Saturday, Nov. 9 to [email protected]
