Calling 911 for a drink of water?

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I hurry up to triage to find the paramedic yelling at the dumbbunny for wasting her time.

HAHAHAH YEESSSS. It's contagious~!

[Not Lillith]

I'm...a little flabbergasted...the whole idea of calling for an ambulance when you are already at the hospital...

I had to take my husband to the ER last winter and they transfered him to a different hospital about 10 miles away. The charge for that ride was around $300 or so.

Which is of course the reason we didn't call for an ambulance in the first place.

[crazylegs]

Where I am healthcare is free at point of contact.

[Not Lillith]

Where I am 2 days in the hospital during a 1 month lapse in health insurance because you missed the required number of working hours for a month by 30 minutes will cost you $75,000
and when the insurance kicks back in, the follow-up care that is needed will NOT be covered because it now falls under the Pre-Existing Condition clause.

And when you talk to the health insurance agent you will get to have a lovely conversation that goes like this:

Client: "I understand that the hospital stay is not covered, however, the condition I have been diagnosed with is something that I will need to be treated for on a daily basis FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE"
"How do I go about getting the monthly doctor bills covered, or at least some of the medication covered?"

Agent: "We are reviewing your file...and....I see here that a week after your hospital stay you went to see your doctor...WHY did you go to the doctor when you weren't insured?"

C: "Because the hospital told me I needed a follow up exam"

A: "But you weren't insured"

C: "I know"

A: So...you knew you weren't insured, but you still went to the doctor???"

C: "Yes"

A: "I just need to clarify this for the report...Explain to Me WHY you would go see a doctor when you weren't covered by insurance...

C: "Because I didnt want to DIE"

A: "I still don't understand why you would go to the doctor when you weren't covered"

AAAAAARRRRGH

and then 2 weeks later you get to re-do all the reams of paper work and questionaires again because the insurance company has decided to change billing providers.

It's too tiring to even swear about it.

and I just need to add ('cause I'm getting all pissed off again)

That when you are in your 40's pretty much everything is a Pre-Existing Condition.

(Outside of gunshot wounds, traffic accidents, and tripping-over-your-cat-and-falling-out-the-window, of course.)

[Jay 2K Winger]

My mother, during her hospital stays to deal with her periodic cellulitis infections and similar, has never had the nerve to call 911 to deal with some issue like that.

She has, however, had to call her doctor-- who doesn't even work at the hospital-- to inform them that the nurses have forgotten to give her her medication, when the nurses weren't responding to her calls.

[foxytales]

I have called 911 from the emergency room of one hospital...the waiting room after being denied care for my condition--which doctors are told in medical school that "they will NEVER see a case of in their lifetime". The I crawl into their ER with my husband trying to hold onto me. Puking, doubled over in excruciating pain and desperate for help yet, when I tell the doctors what I have and HOW TO HELP ME, I am refused and told "I will give you absolutely no drugs. You are a drug seeker, not an ill person. The disease you claim to have is so rare as to not exist". (had the doctor actually READ my medical record, he would have seen the evidence of my disease and the VERY LONG record of trial and error to come to that diagnosis--15 years)
Now, keep in mind that an attack of my illness also causes mental confusion and changes. My husband has to be my advocate because I am not able to do it myself. When we were summarily bumped back to the waiting room, he picked up the pay phone (no cell at that time, too expensive) and called 911 and demanded that we be taken to a different hospital.

Long story short, ambulance came, took me across town to the other hospital--which just so happened to be OUT of our insurance network-- and very shortly had me fixed up with an IV, glucose and pain management, then had to admit me for a week while the porphyrins worked their way back out of my body. Was a really bad attack and to this day, I don't know what triggered it.

So yeah, sometimes calling 911 from the hospital is your only option. And yes, I did file a complaint against the hospital and the doctor was "disciplined" (read he paid a small fine) and life went on as normal.

[Sapphire Silk]

So yeah, sometimes calling 911 from the hospital is your only option. And yes, I did file a complaint against the hospital and the doctor was "disciplined" (read he paid a small fine) and life went on as normal.

That sucks. I'm so sorry to hear that.

There's no excuse for that. You don't label a patient a drug seeker the first time you see them, especially when they have actual symptoms.

Ugh.

[foxytales]

There's no excuse for that. You don't label a patient a drug seeker the first time you see them, especially when they have actual symptoms.

Ugh.

And THAT is the one reason the "doctor" was disciplined. The fact that I could have died in their waiting room was irrelevant, apparently. That he didn't even OPEN my MR that was 6" thick and see if there was any history if drug seeking...
I wish I could say that that was an uncommon occurrence--rather it is the norm. In the event of an attack, I (or my companion as I am no longer married) call my PCP and let him know I am having an attack and have him meet me at the ER, nowadays. I also avoid triggers like the plague.

People actually wonder why I loathe doctors..(while I have no problem with them on a social basis, professionally, too many of them think GOD is spelled "M.D.")

[Not Lillith]

damn. Sorry to hear that.
My sister has a history of spinal menigitis.
Took her to 5 clinics and no one would see her stating the "drug seeker" paragraph.
finaly got a doctor to see her.


After the exceedingly painful spinal tap.
"OMG WHY DID YOU NOT TAKE HER HERE SOONER???@@!!!!!"

Um. "OMG why would no one see her BEFORE YOU?>????!@#E$@!"

Seriously. Wanted to blame me for the reason her medical treatment had been delayed for so long.

feh.

HATE american medical insurance.

[Kagato]

Ugh, after reading some of the posts in here, it makes me wonder if 'doctors' in america are able to get their license off the back of a wheaties box...

If that sort of thing happened here in NZ the doctor would be dragged before the tribunal before they could say "WTF?" and risk their license being revoked.

[PepperElf]

That depends on location. Every base/post hospital I've been in has a 24 hour ER with full medical care. Sick call has their set hours but the hospitals don't. The NAS here doesn't have any facilities beyond sick call, they have to head into town to the hospital. If they are bad enough they do a direct medivac to Carson City or Reno.

ya. that explains it then. this was an NAS. I should have just gone to the base closer to me ... but I remembered, the last time I did that they whined at me for not going to the NAS instead (where my ship was stationed).

[ADeMartino]

Ugh, after reading some of the posts in here, it makes me wonder if 'doctors' in america are able to get their license off the back of a wheaties box...

If that sort of thing happened here in NZ the doctor would be dragged before the tribunal before they could say "WTF?" and risk their license being revoked.

Over here in America, we wonder the same thing. In many of the cases, however, it's not necessarily the doctor's fault - it's the damned bureaucracy of the insurance companies (which compounds the bureaucracy of the hospitals). Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, idiotic rules and regulations, and lawyers lurking around every corner just itching to sue someone if they don't dot every 'i' and cross every 't'. And who pays for all this? The patient, of course - sometimes in a very dear manner.

My sister passed away a few years ago as a direct result of this sort of insanity. The insurance company pretty much dictated what procedures were to be done, with complete disregard for the doctors' recommendations - and the procedure the doctors wanted to do had a damned good chance of saving her life. By the time the doctors had convinced the insurance company of this, the time when the procedure might have been effective had come and gone, and all they could do for her by that point was try to make her comfortable - 'comfortable' being a relative term, of course.

My hatred for insurance companies is unconditional, infinite, and eternal.

[LillFilly]

In my area a lady called 911 on Burger King The 911 operator is great and calls her on her bs.!

Hee, I love how the operator tells her to act like an adult and asks what she expects the police to protect her from; a wrong cheesburger!? Hmmm, a deviant burger sounds kinda kinky, but yummy at the same time...

And Foxy, that's just insane what you had to go through! Not even checking your file; I thought doctors and hospitals could get in a lot of trouble for denying care because they've wrongfully assumed you're a druggie/person with Muchhausins, etc.