I began this post a couple weeks ago. Let me post it as it was and then at the end I will update you with more in part 2.
Last night we were having dinner in the living room because we had not set up the dining room table. We were all eating around a small table I had decided to use as a coffee table... mainly because I thought it would be safer for our newly cruising Gus. Gus was standing at the table with his new clean canteen cup kind of throwing it around, participating in the dinner by making all of us grab our food and hold it in our laps. He kind of started to rock and then boom! Before I could figure out what happened he was on the ground crying table on top of him and his head on top of the table... I still do not really know what happened. My dad after surveying the table decided it is top heavy and probably not good to let him cruise at it... geesh, really?
Vyk grabbed the screaming baby boy and scooped him up in the way only a daddy can to care for him. As he did I saw blood... and quite a bit. I yelled "there is blood" as I followed him to the bathroom. He ran water on his finger which by now we had determined was hurt. I looked down as he worked and saw his finger cut very deeply as the blood ran down the drain. I said "Vyk, we have to go to the hospital... while I grab clothes think of what hospital we are going to and how we need to get there."
We jumped in the car and were off. Astrid was so upset so I calmed her as we drove... Gus was already pretty calm and had stopped crying.
Vyk decided to go to Texas Children's Hospital. A good choice since we live close to the med center and it is a good hospital. Also, he spent a week in the NICU there so they should have our insurance info, etc... making it simpler.
When we arrived we saw a short line at check in and it did not seem to bad. We waited 30 minutes as his bandage became soaked with blood and I became more and more anxious. Around us were children in every state of sick you can imagine. Mostly coughing, wheezing, clinging to mom, and even throwing up. We were the only person there that looked like we belonged in an ER vs a doctors office. BUT, there were 100's of people waiting. I was struck by how many of the moms I talked to were complacent and compliant with the "process" many explained it to me... in a "Oh honey, sit down.. you are going to be here a while" way... "I have doen this many times.. it takes a while"...
Many children were far sicker then Gus. Many needed to have breathing treatments while they waited. Some were waiting to be admitted to the hospital... Apparently when there are not enough beds this is the only way to get in! REALLY?
It took us hmm 2-3 hrs to be seen... and get a gauze bandage on Gus' finger (which he pulled off shortly afterward)... then it took him another 2-3 hours to be X rayed. At some point we decided to ask if we should go home and make an appointment for the morning... to which we were told "Oh no. He will need care tonight... there is a 8 hr window to suture his finger!"
Then as 8 hrs came and went... they said it was a 8-10 hr window. We were in the ER for about 11-12 hours... give or take drive, park, maybe I am remembering the minutes wrong. Seriously 12 hours. And while we waited we all were with very sick children coughing, throwing up, etc around us.
I am not sure... maybe I am completely wrong in my assessment... but it seemed to me that this was inadequite care. I could not believe (in my apparent naivety) that this was the best we can do as a country to care for our children! Let me remind you of a few facts... this is Texas Children's Hospital... not Ben Taub... this one of THE BEST hospitals esp for children in the country! Also, not that it should matter... but we are insured.. and just for the sake of the record we have excellent insurance.
If I could do it all over again... I think I might have tried driving a bit further into the suburbs to the hospital where I had Astrid... I am not sure it would have been better... but I am pretty sure. I might have even found one of those 24 hour clinics just to go ahead and get it bandaged, x rayed and sutured. I know that the person who sutured him (while I feel fine about the job she did) was not any better then someone there... she was a resedent and had to have someone come and walk her through it. It was obviously her first time removing a finger nail and reattaching it on a tiny finger. Even the shot to numb the finger she had to be walked through... so yeah... I am not sure the care would have been worse.
Then, to add insult to injury... my baby who has had nothing but food in his body... no immunizatons, no antibiotics... they perscribed an antibiotic for. When I questioned them... they said "He has been sitting in a waiting room with an open wound for 12 hours... with sick people... he needs an antibiotic." REALLY!
Yeah, so I ask again... Is this the best we can do? As a country? To care for our children?
And I am not so naive that I do not understand that we are lucky! We are lucky for the care (however sub standard it seemed) that we received.
It was very obvious to me that the system... our health care system in this country is not OK. IT is very sick! And that the backlog in ERs across the country (even in good hospitals) is a product of this. It means that NO ONE gets adiquite care. It means that esp the least of these among us get horrific care in a country that has all of the resources available to it...
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