Complaint Review: Bert Fish Medical Center

Steve Harrell,

President and Chief Executive Officer

Bert Fish Medical Center

Mr. Harrell,

A few day ago, my wife, Muriel, was admitted through your ER for a broken wrist. It was surgically repaired and Dr. White admitted her that evening. Room 210-A.

I spent the night with her. I am so glad that I did. It was, literally, a disaster.

During the night, she asked for pain meds. She was in agony. Her wrist had been surgically repaired. The meds never came. An hour later, we asked again. The nurse came. She said she had not been told about the first request.  TWICE during the night, she had to wait a LONG period after her pain meds wore off.

During the night, an alarm of some sort went off in the next bed. Three very loud beeps followed by a short wait and them more loud beeps.  It took over 30 minutes to get it silenced. This happened twice. Needless to say my wife got no rest!!

In the morning, around 0700, she asked for coffee and breakfast. She was told they “do not make coffee” on that floor. Thus, neither came. She made more than one request. I finally went to the coffee shop.

Then I went to the Cafeteria for some breakfast. For both of us, at 9:15 AM. It was closed!  Open for only one hour.

In mid-morning, she had to go to the bathroom. She had to be assisted. She was too weak. Once inside she was told to hurry. The aide helping her had “other things to do”. She was mortified. Totally humiliated.

Still hungry, she made several requests for something to eat.  Someone brought her crackers while he was going to see about lunch, or at least said he was. Finally, as she was being discharged, around 1:00 PM lunch arrived.  It was a salad and some potato (I think) soup.

I tasted the “soup”. SOUR. Very bad. As for the salad: she had lap band surgery and cannot eat lettuce. No one asked her.  She left hungry after being there for almost 24 hours.

In addition, she is on many meds for her COPD. The hospital has the complete list from a prior ER visit, last year. When she was admitted last week, I went thru the list with the ER nurse. She cannot miss these meds. Needless to say, she missed them all.  No one thought to bring them………… but they were told she needed them.

Overall, effective communications between patient and staff, and patient care, was about zero.

If her recovery is not perfect, smooth,  and painless the next letter will be from an attorney.

John M. Healy