Another trip to another ER

Yup. It was a great weekend.

To start with, Brian and I were at the Cubs/Cards game on Saturday. The seats were awesome - third row behind the Cubs dugout. The weather, however, sucked. It was about 100 degrees with a lot of humidity. Thankfully, after about the fourth inning we were in the shade, which helped a lot.

Bad news...I started to really feel badly during the game. It didn't help that it was hot and that it was a 12 inning game. I spent a few innings down in the secret, only for those who buy expensive tickets bar because it was air conditioned, but it just kept getting worse and worse. I thought I was going to pass out, I was in pain, I was nauseous, and I was too dizzy to walk. It was really uncomfortable.

After calling my doctor on the way home, we waited two hours and go no response. I called again to find that she never received my message. Her response: ER. She said there was too much that had gone on to not get checked out.

So, we visited the Oliver C. Anderson Hospital in Maryville, IL and had the worst hospital experience of our lives. After waiting in pain for half an hour, I was admitted to a bed. A nurse, who was quite surly and never introduced herself, took a very brief (and incomplete) medical history and then never came back. Two hours later, after not seeing anyone at all, we used the call button and were yelled at by a nurse. I simply said, "We've been here for over two hours and haven't seen anyone. Are we going to at some point." The nurse responds that there is only one doctor in the ER for 24 rooms and that they can't help me. She asks if I need something. I say that I need something for pain and she tells me to tell my nurse and hangs up.

Uhm...isn't that why I pressed the call button?

After forty-five more minutes of seeing NO ONE, Brian pulls our nurse out of the hall and the two of them get in a massive fight. She was upset about who knows what (I'm sure it had not been a swell night) and he was really pissed about the lack of communication. There are signs everywhere talking about their "excellent care and quality of service" and Brian, of course, disputed that. He said that we needed something for pain and she basically accused me of being a druggie (which was pleasant) and said that I shouldn't even be in the ER because I have a diagnosis and pain medicine and that I should go home and take that. Brian, in less than a calm manner at this point, explains that when a doctor tells you to go to the ER, you go and that it wasn't our first choice for a fun Saturday night. She says she can't give anything until a doctor sees me. That it's policy to have only one doctor for the ER. That I need to just suck it up and wait.

At this point, I'm in pain, tired, and frustrated. I'm crying because I just want to go home (but I can't because we'll be charged either way at this point - three hours in and we've seen a nurse twice). Brian asks for better communication and is told by the nurse that if they could, they would but that they don't have the ability to check on patients during the night. It was horrible.

Finally, a doctor comes in and tells me it's clearly a kidney infection (from the blood and urine sample). This is a new development since Wednesday (when there was no trace of infection), and explains the chills, dizziness, and dry heaving. I finally get some pain medicine, something for nausea, and some IV fluids. Amazingly, our communication with the nurses now improves. They start to update us on what's going on and keep us informed during our last two hours so that we know what's going on and what we're waiting on. Apparently, now that I'm really sick (and refused an additional prescription for Vicodin, thus blowing the "I"m just looking for drugs" accusation), I'm worth the time.

Anyway, after heading there at 9:30pm and leaving at 3:20am, I just wanted to go to bed. It was a horrible experience. It has been the two times I've had to go there and I can honestly say I never ever ever want to go to that place again. I really missed Bro-Menn and just wanted to be home. We now have antibiotics and I have the appointment with the Urologist tomorrow. Hopefully this is all just (yet another) Kidney infection and we can fix it with (yet another) round of antibiotics and we can forget about the whole kidney stone thing.

Now I'm very tired and want to sleep. Let's hope for a better week this week.