— 01/24/2008
LETTER FROM S.A.: A TALE OF HEALTH CARE

An experience in the emergency ward

I took my daughter to the emergency room in the hospital up the road because of acute lower-back pain and fever, suggesting a probable acute kidney infection. (The next nearest hospital is more than half an hour away, and has been privatised and is now a private cash-cow beyond our means. When I went there some time ago with a problem, I waited four hours to be seen.) My daughter waited six hours to be seen. The doctor then diagnosed acute pyelonephritis, which requires prompt treatment to avoid kidney scarring.

My daughter was dumped in a scruffy general ward, which she shared with two AIDS patients, a schizophrenic and others. During the night two of the AIDS patients were screaming with pain. Eventually an irrate nurse turned up. 'What do you want now?!' And gave them paracetamol (acetominophen), a very mild analgesic. Not morphine - paracetamol without codeine. Two of the woman went on screaming for most of the night and the response was invariably an irritable: 'What is it now?' And paracetamol.
 
A case of acute demoralisation in public health care

Another woman had morphine prescribed by the doctors (who come round for a few minutes once a day) because of acute pain, but she was only given it the next day because the dispensary had run out. A very young woman giving birth was screaming half the night and was then transferred somewhere else because the baby's heart was in distress and it coudn't come out. As I stood waiting outside I heard a woman screaming for about half an hour in an emergency ward in a different wing. She was still screaming when I left.

Nurses were wandering past the window from which the screams came and hardly looked up. The toilets were filthy and what I saw of the kitchens looked scary. Her pillow stank of something or other. This morning my daughter had to wait five hours for her discharge and medication. Am I going to do anything about it? NO. What's the point. I've been thinking about the absence of pethedine & morphine - of course, it's being stolen and sold.