A Visit to a Canadian Hospital (cont.)

Richard in the Emergency Room

By the time Richard was unloaded from the ambulance, his history was restored. The ambulance crew and the hospital emergency room crew wheeled Richard through some doors to a spot in a large room next to a hospital gurney to which they transferred him. The emergency room people clustered around the gurney. A nurse started slapping some sensor pads on Richard's chest while another was sliding the IV needle into an arm vein. Sensor nurse untangled some wiring and snapping the wires into the sensor pads routed the other end to a monitor which began a steady beeping after being switched on. One of the nurses pulled a white blanket over Richard. Another nurse walked up with a clipboard and began asking admission questions.

Richard explained his health insurance coverage by saying he had a health maintenance organization (HMO) and the emergency room people needed to call up the 1 800 number since this hospital was definitely out of network. The nurse took the HMO card from Richard's wallet and walked off to take care of the business side of the admission. The emergency room personnel left him alone for a while.

The emergency room was cold and the blanket wasn't really sufficient to keep the cold at bay. Richard lay there uncomplainingly, exhausted after the night's events. Then he realized he was about to throw up again. Calling for a nurse, Richard tried to hold it as long as possible but the nurse didn't quite make it before Richard started retching, staining the blanket a bit but getting most of it into a small bucket the nurse held steady. Richard noticed there was blood on the pillow and putting his hand to the back of his head felt the crusted, dried blood in his hair. No wonder his head hurt, it had a hole in it.

Feeling better, Richard lay back and actually dozed for a while. The nurse came back by to check on his condition and answered his question as to whether the HMO had been notified with an affirmative. Richard told her he was feeling better and that he would like to telephone his wife, Elaine, to let her know what was going on and that his travel plans were being changed due to circumstances beyond his control. Since Elaine is an early riser, Richard felt comfortable telephoning her at 6am that Thursday morning knowing he would catch her before she left for work.

Elaine accepted the collect call. Richard summarized the night's events, judiciously editing where appropriate. Elaine thought it best that she fly up and make sure he was really okay. Richard asked the nurse how long he would be there. The nurse replied that he might be in for a day or two for observation. Richard thought it would be comforting to see a familiar face and agreed to Elaine flying up.