Possum Philosophy: A lasting ‘gift’ from ER trip

By ROBERT CAHILL/Columnist

There are few places on earth I find any less pleasant than a hospital emergency room waiting area. I hate them. I know of absolutely nothing good that has ever come from me having to make a trip and spend time in one.
On Tuesday, Nov. 11, Veterans Day, I arose early and got ready to make my semi-annual pilgrimage to the Veterans Wall of Honor in Saltville. My brother Rusty and I have numerous relatives who were in the military. We were taught to respect and honor our service men and women. And we were taught to show our respect at all times, not just holidays.
As I sat at my childhood home, talking with my brother and Lynn, my sister, the phone rang. It was my wife and she sounded upset. As I soon learned, she had good reason. My 83-year-old mother-in-law had taken a bad fall and was in the emergency room of Bristol Regional Medical Center. I was just about to say I was heading that way when my wife said they were evidently going to release her and I did not need to come. Not a problem since ER waiting areas are far from my favorite place.
Nothing good comes from time spent waiting in ERs. For one thing, most folks put off going to the doctor until nearly too late anyway so one is in the company of those most in need of medical attention. I took my time, finally moseying on home, arriving there shortly after Terry and her mother. Considering her age, the fact that she suffers from osteoporosis, and had taken a very nasty fall, she did not seem in too bad a shape, not as badly injured as I feared. In fact I was amazed. I figured at the least, something was broken; fortunately it was not.
Oddly, this ER is the one that has been running advertisements in local media, telling of short wait times and fast efficient care. After waiting approximately two hours to see a doctor, they had to wait another hour and a half for radiology to do a CT Scan. Eventually, the doctor gave it a quick perusal, said he saw nothing broken and sent her home. Fortunately, he was right about nothing being broken. Unfortunately, he was not as accurate in his assessment that she was ready to come on home.
She was groggy as could be but having been pumped full of various drugs for pain. It was no wonder she went to bed very early that evening. Terry and my stepdaughter Melissa kept a constant watch on her throughout the night, just in case.
The next day by supper she felt terrible. Terry, being the experienced nurse she is, noticed her fingers were showing signs of a lack of oxygen and she was so weak she could barely move. Terry immediately called 911 and it was off to the ER once more.
I had almost been lucky enough to forget what an evening spent waiting in the ER was like. At first it wasn’t too bad. Only a few folks were there and one couple left shortly after we arrived. Naturally Terry and Melissa were back in the dark recesses of the ER waiting with Terry’s mom. So I sat and watched TV while I waited. It was actually somewhat peaceful. There was one small family and they were fairly quiet. There were a couple of guys there, one waiting on his wife who had injured her arm or wrist some way. The other was waiting to see a doctor and was in some pain but didn’t really bother anyone. He spoke a time or two and seemed like a nice fellow. Then it started. A lady came in looking for a relative. She apparently she had beaten the ambulance because no one was there yet. She looked sick as a dog herself. I should have had enough sense to leave then. I didn’t.
Soon the room started filling up. One family was relatively large filling most of the seats in the small waiting area and overflowing into the snack bar which was part of the room. They ranged in age from folks older than me (no nasty comments please) to an infant so young and tiny I was surprised that someone had brought the child to an ER waiting room, since neither the child or its parents were there to see a doctor, but were waiting on word from a family member.
Now for anyone lucky enough to have never needed to visit an ER, the waiting areas are tiny. Hospitals don’t expect to have large numbers of people just waiting there. They also expect the ones there to only be there briefly (for us ER veterans, this is the point where we laugh at such an assumption). They think if you are there to see a doctor you will only wait a few minutes (another laugh) before seeing the physician. They also don’t expect large family groups to accompany the person (they obviously do not know Appalachian folks very well; we all turn out for sick family). To get to the point, they are small, uncomfortable and crowded in the best of times, and for some reason, perhaps the holiday, extremely so that night.
As I mentioned, they are almost always crowded with sick folks, very sick—like the lady I mentioned earlier. Apparently the person she was worried about had arrived, as she kept going back into the area where the patients were being examined. Finally, she came back out and the only empty seat was (drum roll here…) close to me. Ordinarily this would not have been a problem. I’m a pretty gregarious boy and will talk to almost anyone. Besides, she was sick enough she wasn’t exactly looking to strike up a conversation anyway.
As many of you have found out the hard way, there is a particularly nasty strain of some kind of bug making the rounds in this area. It causes vomiting and lots of time sitting on “the throne” in the bathroom if you get my drift. This lady had a bad case. She was just starting to make another trip to check on her family member when it hit her. She threw up violently and with great volume. It left her so weak she had to sit back down.
Finally, at approximately 3 a.m., Terry and I returned home. My mother-in-law was admitted to the hospital and spent a couple of days in there. Melissa spent the night in the room with her grandmother.
Apparently, my mother-in-law has developed a lung disease that affects her breathing to the point she now needs oxygen much of the time. The doctors believe it is likely the result of her being a smoker for many years although she also quit several years ago. Still, all things considered, she is doing well.
And me, well I spent the next couple of days running back and forth to the hospital as one does when one has a family member hospitalized. And yes, I did get a souvenir from my “Evening at the ER.” To paraphrase Margaret Mitchell’s book, “Gone With the Wind,” thanks to the kindness of strangers, I am just now, nearly two weeks later, finally getting over the my gift from the lady in the ER. I have ached, hurt and generally felt miserable.
I have eaten a bushel of Immodium tablets, and drunk five or so gallons of Pepto-Bismol. I have been weak and weary without let up. As I said, absolutely no good comes from time spent in the ER. My advice, unless you are the patient in dire need, stay as far away from the ER as possible.

A freelance journalist, Robert “Rocky” Cahill writes regularly for the News & Messenger. His Possum Philosophy column appears in each Saturday edition.