How does everyone feel about the state of Health Care System?
On a side note here...has anyone noticed while either visiting someone...or being there themsleves...the amount of dust that is in hospitals? No lie...when I was in there for surgery...I could have sworn that I was in the wild west with all the dust bunnies resembling tumble weeds rolling around the floors. Nevermind the cobwebs hanging from all the lights!!
Woman waits four days for surgery on leg break
Action taken only when legal secretary threatened to sue
Susy Horna spent four pain-filled days in Surrey Memorial Hospital waiting for an operation on her broken leg.
Horna, 48, a legal secretary who broke her leg shovelling snow, said her concerns were taken seriously only when she threatened to sue.
"You can't eat for 12 hours before surgery, so I didn't have anything to eat from Wednesday to Saturday," Horna said yesterday from her hospital bed, recovering from her Saturday operation. "The only thing they offer you is morphine."
Horna said she was denied a request to transfer to another hospital.
She said that if she faced the same situation again she would go to Vancouver's new private clinic for help.
"I would like to register at an emergency clinic," she said. "Even though I got my operation, it's a bittersweet victory. I know I had to bump someone to get my option."
Savik Sidhu, spokesman for the Fraser Health Authority, said treatment is not done on a first-come, first-serve basis.
"It's based on the acuity of the condition," Sidhu said.
"We understand it can be inconvenient when patients must wait a little bit longer than they hoped."
He said the private clinic would not have been able to deal with Horna's injury because patients can't stay the night at the facility after a procedure.
Sidhu also said the private clinic can't take patients who arrive by ambulance.
Horna was operated on the day after Dr. Mark Godley opened the for-profit Urgent Care Centre in Vancouver.
The B.C. government threatened to shut it down. But after talks with Health Minister George Abbott, the clinic dropped its plans to charge patients hundreds of dollars per visit. Instead, patients may use their Medical Services card to get treatment.
Abbott told Global TV the new clinic will help the public system deal with backlogs.
"The [private clinic] allows our operating rooms and hospitals to devote themselves to more serious injuries and more complex surgeries like hip replacements," Abbott said.
Today, Godley will ask Surrey council for permission to set up a private health-care facility in Newton.
He is trying to get zoning approval for the private hospital, and Surrey council is to hold a public hearing tonight.
Horna's husband, Carlos Horna, said he would welcome another medical option after his wife's four-day ordeal.
"I'm very disappointed with the whole system," he said. "There is apparently a private clinic coming into the system.
"The system isn't working, so the private clinics should be allowed."
Horna said she came forward with her story to help other people.
"I'm doing this because I think there are a lot of people that have been in my situation," she said, "because they are scared or because they have English as a second language.
"I got very upset, and I said I'm going to talk to a lawyer. Because I'm a legal secretary, they knew I could do that."
Horna also worried about the possibility of catching an illness because of the extended stay in hospital.
"You're afraid that you'll go in with a broken leg and come out with who-knows-what."
Horna stressed that her problem is with the system, not with the individual caregivers.
"The nurses have been very helpful -- it's not their fault."
On a side note here...has anyone noticed while either visiting someone...or being there themsleves...the amount of dust that is in hospitals? No lie...when I was in there for surgery...I could have sworn that I was in the wild west with all the dust bunnies resembling tumble weeds rolling around the floors. Nevermind the cobwebs hanging from all the lights!!