Posted on 12/31/2010 3:21:22 PM PST by NoGrayZone
"As his tiny daughter's skin turned blotchy and her body went limp during a lengthy wait at Methodist Hospital's emergency room, Ryan Jeffers panicked."
"The family's ordeal began on a Sunday morning in early December, when the normally rambunctious Malyia developed a fever and became lethargic, Ryan Jeffers recalled."
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
I am not a mother, actually, the only one amongst close friends and family members who isn't and this doesn't sit right.
As a parent, what would your response have been?
Please don't get me started on emergency rooms. Last time I went was for a tetanus shot and the nurse seemed ticked off the illegals were taken first, who had "pain in her arm when she lifted it".
Illegals, who pay nothing for thier health care, get to go first.
Thank you for voting democrat.
Are you thanking me for voting democrat?
Well, in defense of the parents, kids get fevers now and then for all kinds of reasons. You really can’t go rushing off to the ER for every fever. Sometimes teething causes a fever. And it is flu season. I’m assuming they gave her children’s Tylenol or Motrin and waited to see if that would reduce the fever; that’s basically the standard procedure, or at least what my pediatric nurse sil tells us to do when ours develop a fever. If fever and lethargy were her only symptoms I really can’t say the parents did anything wrong here.
Poor baby, may God help her adjust. :( :( :(
Poor child.
Thanks for your insight. I think I got carried away with this poor little girls tragedy.
My daughter, at 18 months, slept for 18 hours once. When she woke up and was listless, we took her to the emergency room. She “brightened” up while there and all the nurse said was that she looked fine and wasn’t it a blessing that she’d slept that long. Nurses aren’t doctors. I made them call my pediatrician and he ordered a chest x-ray. She had pneumonia.
Oh my gosh!! I can’t imagine. Please tell me the rest of the story, if you have time.
The parents did things right. It’s not appropriate to run to an ER every time a child starts to run a fever. If the urgent care doc decided she needed a full-blown ER, though, they should have called ahead and alerted them - perhaps they did and it was the ER triage nurse that slowed things down. Horrible story though with definite grounds for malpractice on someone’s part.
According to the article the child’s genetic makeup contributed to the problem.
Kids get fevers all the time.
That said, these infections are very fast moving, and I doubt that either the emergency room reception or the family understood that. My next door neighbor almost died of an infection he got from a tiny scrape he received from bumping into the pot of a plant that was on his steps.
I went into an emergency room with a family member who had had a stroke (we didn’t realize it) and the girls at the desk were all watching Jerry Springer and couldn’t give us the time of day. We sat there for hours and I kept going up to the desk, and finally I saw a doctor going by and told him about it (fortunately, I speak English).
We got in right away and my family member received the appropriate treatment. But I bet nothing ever happened to the girls at the desk.
The moral of the story, according to my former paramedic daughter, is...call an ambulance. If you come in from an ambulance call, you go right into the ER (where there are professionals) and don’t sit in the waiting room with some brain-dead “admitting personnel” rebraiding their hair and watching Jerry Springer or some imitator doing shows on 500 pound lesbians (I kid you not, that was on the air when we were there). It was like dying and going to hell.
Sometimes my anger bursts into ALL involved when it comes to a precious helpless one.
Heck, I freak out if it’s one of my kitties.....which is why I am NOT a mother. Some weren’t born to breed, and I heeded Gods advise!
She showed no symptoms of any kind. And she usually slept very little. Dr Saluja had her admitted. Believe me that nurse disappeared. She was trying to send us home. My daughter was in the hospital 3 days on oxygen. Dr Saluja said that parents know when a child is behaving out of character and when they’re that young sometimes behavior is the only barometer that something is wrong. He was an EXCELLENT pediatrician.
It’s a freak accident. NOthing can be done and there’s no armchair quarterbacking to be done after the fact. These things happen but are very rare. The kid lived and that’s a miracle.
You just can’t take a chance.
A couple of weeks ago there was some poor parent here on FR with a child who had a middle ear infection. The eardrum had already ruptured.
People here on FR were telling him to put stuff in the kid’s ear. NOT a good idea.
Those bad ear infections can move quickly to meningitis with a really bad outcome.
You just cannot take any chances with a child. Actually, you can’t take chances with an adult either. Better to feel embarrassed in the ER than dead in the morgue.
I will remember that and pass it on to family and friends.
Imho, parents know when something is wrong with their child. Thank goodness that you persevered. It may well have saved your daughter’s life.
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Good advice.
You should take a look at DJ’s post above yours.
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