Well it happened again in my life. In fact I think I’m becoming a regular going to the emergency room at our local hospital. First off you must know one thing, if you decide your going to visit the emergency room. You can count on at a minimum 4 hours if your lucky. On average, I’ve got to bet its more like 6.5 hours of your life.
Grandma (my mother-in-law) was sick so you know who “The Chosen One” (me) got to accompany her on this exciting experience. One new tip for those of you thinking of going down this path. Go on a weekday not a weekend! Everyone is off from work and doing stupid things on the weekend and their doctors aren’t available so they come in mass to compete with you for the privilage of who gets to go in first. I kept telling Grandma (who actually had Bronchitis but wasn’t coughing at all now that we were there) to pretend like she was having problems breathing but no, she sat there very quiet and eventually dozing off to sleep a little. Two hours later we both wake up to someone calling her name. So we get to leave the germ infested waiting area and get to go to room number 4. Of course now its time to punish me more… The last time I was here with Grandma we were in the same room number 4 and they had installed tv’s for your enjoyment! It greatly helped to pass the time away when we were here last time. Of course this time the tv didn’t work and I was having to face my mother-in-law for more endless hours of fun. In the middle of the “pit” (nurses station) they have a 42″ screen tv displaying all the patients like a spread sheet. I found my mother-in-law on line four and at some point the column for “length of stay” turns red. Two other people had red backgrounds also but they were at 6 hours or more. We had at some point passed 4 hours and it went red. At least you knew they were noticing you because as your hours increased they seem to pay more attention to you as if they were on some sort of time limit. I was afraid to see what happened once you got to 7 hours. So the hospital is trying to make an effort to improve your experience when you visit. Everyone seemed overly friendly compared to previous visits. Then I noticed they had signs all over about customer service and to please fill out their survey. The nurses kept repeating their names so we would remember them. Then when checking out, the papers had their names typed out so we could spell them correctly. You know I’m in the hotel business and when ever the guests have a bad experience like the tv not working they complain they want a free room for the night. I wonder how far I could carry this?