There are always people laying in gurneys, sleeping, asking for pain meds, complaining about the cold, and diverse other things. Sometimes it seems to be like a hatchery of sorts. People with all sorts of problems.
It is often a challenge to maneuver other Patients around in their gurneys. Ventilated Patients simply must have a bay because that is where the 50 PSI ports are for O2 and Medical Air (which is simply pressurized air.) Therefore there is often a shuffling around of gurneys, and this stuff goes on 24/7. Workers of course get used to it after a while, but the average person would likely be quickly mystified by just how hectic it all is.
Once the Patients are methodically contended with, they are either admitted or discharged. The admitted Patients are brought up to ‘Floors’ or ‘Observation Units.’ The Trauma Patients are typically stabilized, taken to CT Scan (or X-Ray, MRI, or Surgery, sometimes the Morgue.) Following the Scans, those surviving Patients are transferred to ‘Units’ or ICUs.
Most ICU Patients are heavily sedated. If it was not already done, they will have ‘A-lines’ (Arterial) inserted and their Vitals are carefully monitored nonstop. Once the need for Intensive Care is passed, Patients are relocated to Step-Down Units or ‘the Floors.’ Few Patients are actually discharged from the ICUs.
Over the course of such experiences the most impersonal areas of the Hospital probably seem to be the ER and ICUs but that is exactly opposite. The focus in those areas is assessment and treatment. Those ICU Nurses are highly specialized. They know their stuff. They are not there to trade Christmas Cards and watch Soaps. They do things with precision and purpose.
On the Floors is where people get visitors. There they can complain about the quality of the food or a myriad of other things. Often good relationships are developed between families, Nurses, and Patients.
The impersonal aspects of the Hospital experience likely occurs just inside the doors. Listening to those EMTs describing what happened ‘in the field’ is something which must be done. Did they administer Dopamine? What was the blood pressure, O2 Sat, heart rate and rhythm? In those areas it is usually all about Biology, Anatomy, Physiology, not readily visible traumas. It is all strictly business.
I have difficulty acknowledging this notion that Hospitals are killing Patients. Certainly not in my Hospital are they doing that. Perhaps, later in the ‘Cause of Death’ Reports there are shenanigans going on. Nobody knows what the Administration is up to. They are not on the Front Lines.
I am in accord that there are shady things likely going on, but the idea that Doctors are killing Patients or letting them die by withholding interventions is simply something that I cannot reconcile, at all. There are vastly too many knowledgeable people always about. It simply could not be gotten away with.