Worst ER Experience...

[Guest guest]

Ok, for the past four days I've had a temp ranging from between 99.6 and 102 and

my pain has been worse than normal. When my fever stayed at 102 for about half

the day, and when my pain spiraled out of control on Monday afternoon, my

partner Rod, also a medic like me, and the reason I get up in the morning,

encouraged me to go to ER and get checked out... Here's what happened...

Nightmare on Dodge Street.

Well, I hope this makes sense, as I'm a little bit sedated, no thanks to the

damn ER staff.

Here's what happen. We get there and get me right in to triage. Now I know,

being a medic, that I'm gonna have to wait a while. No biggy, we'll

wait as long as I get treated. So we go into triage and they take my vitals. BP

was 130 over 87. Pulse was 124. Oxygen saturation was 99. Temp was 102.

Now, the BP is a little high for me, the pulse about normal when my pain is bad

or when I'm anxious, and I was both in bad pain and very anxious...

So, they tell us we'll have to wait in the waiting room till a bed opens up...

So, we wait.

The longer we wait, the more Rod can see that I'm in real pain. Finally we get

in a room. The doc comes in and says he wants to order some labs. I say, " I

think this is a Lupus flare and I want some steroids. " Doc says, " No problem,

I'll give you your 'roids, something for pain and something for

nausea. "

We think...Finally, I'm gonna get some relief. Well, that wasn't to be. The

nurse comes in and Rod asks what he's giving me. He says, " Well, I'm going

to start an IV take some blood and give him Iso, (a steroid), and something for

nausea. " Aren't you going to give me anything for pain? " I asked. " Oh,

the steroids are what you're getting for pain. "

Well, Rod and I look at each other in disbelief. So, they stick me about fifty

times, I lost count at 21, and finally, I say, " Just give me the damn

needle " and do it myself. They give me my meds and we wait and wait and wait

some more.

I then turn and say to Rod, " Rod, I'm in so much pain, I think I'm going to

black out. " So Rod flag down the doctor and rather scathingly ask when these

steroids are suppose to start relieving my pain... He says in a few minutes.

Then, he proceeds to tell me that even if they don't work, he can't give

me anything for pain since my BP was 98 over 57. Now, I want to know just how

that can be since I only had my BP taken once and I know what it was...

They ask me if I will take a drug test and I say, " Sure. " They do the drug

screen and then finally, after I was literally hanging onto consciousness

by the thinnest of threads, come in and give me a teeny weeny bit of morphine

which only barely took the edge off and I wouldn't even go that far...

They get around to discharging us and give me my scripts. A pred pack, a med for

nausea and Norco... I was in so much pain once I got out to the

car that I passed out. Rod dosed me up on morphine from the drug box we carry on

our ambulance, regulations be damned, Harry our director said he could, and now

I'm at home and I'm going to try to

eat, but I might not as I don't have much of an appetite.

When I asked just what was causing my fever, I was told it was " a Lupus thing " .

Guys and gals, what is " a Lupus thing " ? I think I missed that one in paramedic

school.

So... That's how it went. I had good reason to be anxious.

--

Dodge

An optimist thinks that this is the best possible world.

A pessimist fears that this is true.

Read my blog at:

http://jumpthis.wordpress.com