Also, maybe you should call your neuro or whoever is on call and let them know you feel the need to go to the ER. When first diagnosed and totally new to the MS situation, my brother who is a neuro in another state called the hospital I was going to and had them alerted to be ready for me.

He then called my doctor. That is how I learned a neuro is on staff 24/7.

Dear Aarcyn,

I know your post was directed to Starznight, but I would like to respond.

MY expectations upon going to a hospital emergency room is to be treated with RESPECT. Thankfully, the few times I have ever needed the use of an emergency room was for an acute incident that required immediate care, not for any "episodes" related to chronic issues.

When I fell and broke 5 ribs, knowing that there is not much anyone can do for that, I initially declined to go to the hospital. After a few hours of very painful breathing, and fear that I may have injured some other internal organs, I did go to the emergency room. NO, I did not expect them to "fix" me or make me better. I knew that only time would heal my broken ribs. What I needed was to be sure that no "other" damaged had been done, AND they did give me a prescription for the pain to get me through the night and the next few days.

They x-rayed my ribs, informed me that 5 were broken, and handed me a prescription for pain meds. I handed the prescription back to the physician and told him that pain meds made me much too sick and I did not need nor want to be throwing up with 5 broken ribs. Unless he gave me something to prevent the nausea that the pain meds would cause, I did not want the prescription. He then gave me TWO prescriptions, one for nausea and the other for pain.

At least I was not treated in the same manner as Starznight. I was treated with respect and was definitely NOT treated like a drug seeker.

Without realizing it at the time, I guess you might say that I actually DID go to the ER "seeking" drugs. I really had not thought about that until they were offered. My primary reason was to be sure I was not injured further than what I knew. Having broken many bones in my life, I KNEW before having x-rays that I had broken some ribs. I just did not know it was FIVE of them.

My point is, no matter WHAT expectations Starznight may have had, she should have been treated with respect.

Dear Hopeless,

Since you were kind enough to respond directly to me...

Respect. It is a word that requires a certain amount of perception and sometimes in retrospect, perceived slights can over time be understood as emotions gone extreme.

The ER doctors and staff do not necessarily know a patient well enough to prescribe medication like Oxycodone and could be sanctioned for not taking the appropriate steps to ensure the patient actually warrants a heavy narcotic.

And often, Meds like Oxycodone and Ambien are on a watch list flagged if a doctor or patient abuse. If I am not mistaken, addicts often go to a variety of pharmacies to avoid detection.

Expecting respect. It just seems a foggy perception rather than anything I can look at concretely. And from the amount of pain in Starz post, there seemed like a thin line between receiving good medical care and not being understood.

For example: when the doctor grabbed Starz and yelled, perhaps she had become unresponsive and the doctor was trying to pull her from lapsing into an unconscious state.

The ER was packed. People are not seen in order of when they come in but rather in the order of greatest need.

I was only hoping to help in cases of her expectations not being met and attempting to help people be their own best advocate.

Dear Aarcyn,

I have copied a few excerpts from Starznight's first post on the thread and have colored in RED, the parts that were most offensive to me and what I regard as total disrespect and totally uncalled for and most unprofessional.

Let's pretend for just a moment that the patient was someone other than Starznight and really was a "drug seeker". A true professional should not speak to the patient nor the parents of the patient in the manner in which this physician spoke. There are different ways of handling drug seeking patients and I doubt that this physician's technique would be advantageous to anyone.

This is about the same as walking into a room and assuming that the teenager that resides in the household broke the vase laying in pieces on the floor. The parent punishes the kid for the incident, and then goes on to lecture on the need to be more careful and demands the kid get an after school job to earn the money to pay for the broken vase. The sad part of this story is the kid did NOT break the vase. The cat jumped up and knocked the vase off the table.

This doctor was just WRONG in the way they treated Starznight. I was NOT referring to the exam, the grabbing of the arm, or the triage method utilized by this facility. I was referring to the assumption that the patient was an addict and the verbalizations made by the physician.

There is such a thing as "The Patient's Bill of Rights", and I believe it was clearly violated by this physician. One of the FIRST items mentioned in this bill of rights is the patient's right to be treated respectfully.

I agree that doctors are put in a precarious position since there ARE people that are seeking drugs and that physicians are at risk of losing their license to practice if they do not pay attention to this fact. But, for me, I can find NO excuse for the behavior exhibited by this physician.

I do not know if it is nationwide, but in MY locale, one must present proper identification at a pharmacy before obtaining drugs in certain classes. And going from pharmacy to pharmacy is of NO aid to the drug seeker as there is a database connecting ALL pharmacies with each other to halt that particular abuse.

I agree that "expectations" are different from person to person and may not be met while the facility or medical professional did everything properly and within guidelines. I just don't see that to be the case here. I do not find any excuse for the physician to have spoken to Starznight or her parents in the manner in which he/she did.

I agree that one must learn to advocate for themselves whenever they can and have someone act as their advocate if necessary. While Starznight was having difficulty being her own advocate due to her condition at the time, she did have family members trying to advocate for her to no avail. The physician was just NOT listening.

I am just very glad that this particular physician is not representative of most. Many doctors still know how to listen and to treat patients with respect.

This quote from your post. I must agree that the word "respect" has different connotations and can be vague at times, but I think it is a generally understood term as used in the patients bill of rights. I do NOT think Starznight was treated with respect when the physician stated as a fact, something only assumed and not known to be true.

*administrative edit"

Since you mentioned that your brother is a neuro, maybe you are sensitive to any challenges made toward a physician. This was NOT a doctor bashing post. Starznight spoke highly of another doctor encounter at the same facility. It was just this ONE particular doctor that was in my opinion worth being reported for his demeanor.

I sincerely apologize if I misunderstood your post. I may have mistaken your questions as an attempt to put all responsibility onto the patient, not the facility providing the care. I am not sure that patients have control to see the neuro on call when in an ER. That is usually determined by the ER staff physicians, at least in my area. It is against hospital policy to allow patients to eat or drink anything that was not provided to them by the hospital (especially in the ER) so having someone go to a vending machine would NOT be allowed in my hospital.

Thank you Hopeless, sorry it has taken me a bit to get back into this discussion. One thing that I didn't make very clear in my rant, is the second Doctor I saw was actually the admitting Doctor. She was not technically the ER doctor, I was admitted to the hospital already, but say it was my ER experience because I never left the ER bay. I spent 2 days there, well almost 3 days.

I don't know why the neuro wasn't involved, my mom did ask if the admitting (druggie accusing) Doctor had even consulted him. And the doctors answer was when I left there I was welcome to walk across the street and see him.

To acyryn, I do know the insanity of ERs, my mom was a long time EMT, my grandmother a nurse, along with 2 aunts and an uncle. My expectations for medical care in the ER is basically stabilize to send home or stabilize to admit. I don't run to the ER for a bandaid and then cry because it took them four hours to give me one. If I'm going to the ER it is because there is a very real probability that there is some illness or injury which requires IMMEDIATE MEDICAL ATTENTION. I am in very real distress, my care can not wait till next Friday when my pcp has an appt available, or until morning when walk-in care is open on the chance it appears to be anything walk-in care can treat for.

What I expected as a human being regardless of being in an ER or my local grocers, is to be treated with at least half as much respect as a house hold pet.

Assume for just a moment, you brought your pet, dog/cat/bird... To an emergency vet service, the poor thing just wouldn't stop crying, you couldn't get it to move properly. But you bring it to the closest place you can find that's open, rather than risking a further trip or waiting till morning to bring them to your vet. Now you're back there with you beloved baby who is so clearly in pain. But the vet takes one look at you... You're in your pjs, unkept, a bit blurry eyed... Your dog gives a whimper in pain and the vet snatches them by the scruff and gives them a shake telling them to quit play acting. What a terrible parent you have, typical drug seeking behavior... Get the dog to play poor poochie so the owner can take their meds... Well no meds for you, you get an aspirin and that's it....

How many pet owners would let that fly?! How many associations? ASPCA?? The Humane Society? The Veterinarian Licensings Boards? How many people would be up in arms ready to riot over the vet. And yet because I'm human I don't deserve the same amount of respect I would most certainly expect for my pets from their veterinarians.

So yeah... Kind of what I expect. I'm not going for an omni omni poof! You are better. I'm going to the ER with pretty fair expectations on being admitted to the hospital for something, and upon admitting, especially during the week, I expect the doctor who takes over my care, has contacted my doctors already... Hopefully before torturing me and calling me a druggie.

And yes my husband was told by the nurse that under no circumstances could he go and get me food, my mother was told the same thing. Nothing to eat or drink that isn't given by hospital staff from the time you check-in

I can understand the no "other" food rule if there is a reason you shouldn't be eating, or only eating a special diet..

But if they messed up the meal, or wrong time for the cafeteria, or didn't get it into the room, I'd have someone go get me something even if they have to sneak it in to me.
What would they do anyway, take the food away , kick family out??

Funny you should ask about that... Not too long ago it was being put out on the news about a patient being kicked out of the hospital for ordering food from the outside. In all fairness it was a patient who was hospitalized awaiting gastric bypass, only they had to wait for him to loose so much weight before he could have the surgery, and he did order himself a large pizza. So the hospital kicked him out, offended tons of folks.

But the hospital justified their decision based on their no outside food/drinks policies for their patients. And if you think about it.. If they're treating me thinking it's just a uti shouldnt restrict my diet right?... Except salt content... Moisture content... Sugar content.... What if it's really a sudden wheat sensitivity, or some other allergy. Remove the control on what the patient eats and drinks and they could be setting themselves up for various malpractice suits.

But at the same time, the nurses stations always used to have at least saltine crackers for nauseous patients, why couldn't she grab me a pack??? It doesn't need to be a lot of food with the pills, just something to keep the acids from demolishing the pills on contact and to slow up the ingesting process a bit.

Closing this thread for a while.

[Forums Mission Statement -
The purpose of our Community is simple -- it's devoted to support for health, neurological, mental health and related issues. In that vein, you should be civil and treat others as you expect to be treated here. ]

*Thread closure is not related to Starznight's recent post.*
We were typing at the same time most likely.

Hi
I have re-opened this thread for continued discussion.

We needed some edits and deletes. Please remember that we have guidelines on how members should respond to one another, and "calling out" etc in a negative way is a form of flaming. Members can disagree, but please do so agreeably.
Here are the guidelines: http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/showthread.php?t=1293

Most hospitals have a rule about any food or drink being provided to a patient without the consent of the medical staff for a very good reason.

Some may be as follows:

Possible testing that requires fasting.
The need to monitor intake and output of fluid levels.
Possibly special diet restrictions not already in place.

The list could go on and on. In order to properly treat a patient in the hospital, the medical staff needs to be fully aware of everything that is going into a patient's system, be that food, drink, or medications. Many things could be contrary to the care of the patient.

In some cases, things of which the hospital is unaware, could pose potential danger to the patient. The policies of the hospital are not usually arbitrary, while some may seem to be so.

When one of my family members were hospitalized, I asked if it would be OK if I brought coffee from home for the patient. ONLY, after I had "permission" did I bring the coffee.

Just my take on the food topic.