Posted on 01/07/2008 6:09:23 AM PST by Crazieman
Howard Stern...now that's a source for medical information.
All these posts remind me of our hospital in a small Indiana town in the 50s and 60s. Mostly Mennonite staff and administration.
The care was superb (you actually got nightly back rubs, treats and help washing every day). The food was home-cooking type good and everything was super clean.
Have to wonder if that has changed over the years. I know it’s not that way now anywhere I’ve lived since (Fla., Calif. Ariz.).
All these posts remind me of our hospital in a small Indiana town in the 50s and 60s. Mostly Mennonite staff and administration.
The care was superb (you actually got nightly back rubs, treats and help washing every day). The food was home-cooking type good and everything was super clean.
Have to wonder if that has changed over the years. I know it’s not that way now anywhere I’ve lived since (Fla., Calif. Ariz.).
All these posts remind me of our hospital in a small Indiana town in the 50s and 60s. Mostly Mennonite staff and administration.
The care was superb (you actually got nightly back rubs, treats and help washing every day). The food was home-cooking type good and everything was super clean.
Have to wonder if that has changed over the years. I know it’s not that way now anywhere I’ve lived since (Fla., Calif. Ariz.).
Aaaargh! PJ, I love you, man, but TMI! TMI! TMI!
“Hemorrhoids are usually caused by straining from various causes.”
Four days of nothing but sub sandwiches did it to me once.
Once he noticed a nurse putting up a new IV bag and he noted that it looked different than what he had been getting. She almost had hooked him up to the wrong medication.
Another time they rolled the bed over his oxygen hose. The worse was when he was complaining about pain in his upper shoulder and the nurse kept giving him more and more IV pain medication. He called me and was so incoherent that I thought it was a prank call. It ended up that the pain block was only for his chest area and all he needed was a Tylenol 3 for his upper shoulder.
Something we learned is that you need a family member there all the time.
That is the eyes bulging, ears ringing; I’ll never do this again experience. You’re lucky there wasn’t a blood pressure cuff around your arm at that time. That would have scared you to death.
That is the eyes bulging, ears ringing; I’ll never do this again experience. You’re lucky there wasn’t a blood pressure cuff around your arm at that time. That would have scared you to death.
Hemmorrhoids are varicosed veins around the anus and rectum. External hemmorrhoids are distal to the confluence of the rectal mucosa and the squamous cells of the anus. Internal hemmorrhoids are "inside" or proximal to the line which demarcates the external anal skin. Often their occurrance goes hand in hand, but not always.
Increased intraoperative pressure increases the risk of developing hemmorrhoids, such as straining at the stool, pregnance, truck drivers (notorious for developing hemmorrhoids). Often times hemmorrhoids (varicosed veins around the rectum and anus) will thrombose (form a clot). They then may well break down and bleed or become extrememly swollen and exquisitly tender. If examinaltion and history reveals bleeding it is prudent for the surgeon to be sure that the bleeding is not coming from a lesion higher up in the colon, such as a carcinoma.
Definitive treatment for the hemmorrhoid is hemorrhoidectomy. In performing this proceedure it is inevitable that the external sphinter muscle is 'irritated'. Those skilled in this proceedure keep this formost in their minds as they perform this operation. Now, the anal spincter is part of a 2 muscles, the internal and external which attach to a sphincter which is the control 'valve' for urination. Go ahead and "tighten up your ass" and this is what is done to stop the flow of urine.
I SUSPECT, but do not know for sure, as I was not there, the freeper who alluded to "something with is bladder" was alluding to sphinteric spasm which did not allow micturition or urination. Glen probably went into urinary retention, showed up at the ER, and got an exuberent nurse or orderly who placed a foley catheter with a degree of urethral trauma and Glen saw some blood in the urine as it drained into the bag. This is all too common, in fact, it is one of the most common complications after a submucosal hemmorroidectomy, second only to pain.
DISCLAIMER. I was not there. I am spitballing based on 25 years of doing this kind of surgery. It should be pointed out that extremely serious complications can be the result of hemorrhoidectomy.
Had a friend that almost died from peritonitis from a pucture during surgery similar to this.
In my own experience, even with good hospitals and good staff, the process for the impaired is unbelievable. My dad had a massive stroke about eleven months ago and I have spent about 500 hours in hospitals, emergency rooms, and skilled nursing units in the last 11 months. Having a family member there is very important if you are impaired in speech, motion, or by medication and/or pain.
The least breakdown in management controls or staffing can turn an otherwise good facility into the worst in little time.
I arrived at one ER near his nursing home to find him in a darkened exam/triage room, curtains drawn, freezing and unable to move. A momentry oversight after arrival and first exam, but still, you are totally at the mercy of circumstances.
I am sorry what your dad and some of the others here (including Glenn Beck) have had to endure. Watching the end of his show tonight actually brought tears and a flood of memories.
I had major surgery four years ago. It was such a nightmare that I am terrified of ever going to a doctor again, thinking I might have to go back into hospital.
I was left on a porta-potty in the middle of the night, with no buzzer available, the night after surgery. I could not move or scream for help. I sat there thinking I was going to die, for over two hours. (They ‘forgot’ about me.)
In the five days I was there, I was never given a toothbrush. My face was never washed (nor was any other place.) My hair was not brushed once. The food was inedible.
I did’t get a shower for five days, and then (after begging and crying for a shower), was pushed into a storage room with a shower head, left in the wheel chair for over an hour - alone, and not strong enough (and too medicated), to move out of the cold stream of water hitting me. (’Forgotten’, again.)
My sheets were changed only once in those five days.
There was a sign on the door to my room (put there by my request), that anyone touching the patient must wash their hands first. Only two times did I ever see anyone wash their hands.
This treatment cost the insurance company almost ten grand a day. Guess what kind of place I could rent for $10,000 a day? I would have servants everywhere, food made by the most perfect chefs, my own hairdresser and stylist. I would be catered to like a queen.
But at the hospital, I couldn’t even get a toothbrush.
ping
Very serious procedure and llloooonnnggg recovery period. My mom is a veteran of many surgeries and she said the one for the ‘roids was the worst (we’re talking back surgery, hip replacement, heart surgery, c-section, hysterectomy).....
yikes...8!
I had throat surgery about 2 years ago. Due to length of procedure, I had to be admitted overnight instead of outpatient, as it was supposed to be. The surgery created severe “referred” pain in my ears. I had limited ability to talk but asked the nurse to bring me pain meds, not for my throat/neck pain, but because of the excruciating ear pain. She said she would be back with them. That was maybe at 10 p.m. latest....I laid waiting there for her to come back, for hours....she never came back into the room.
I got my pain meds at 6 in the morning, when a nurse finally came and, with tears streaming down my face from enduring hours of throbbing ear pain, I pleaded for pain meds.
I can’t imagine what these people do to others who are much older, or even more immobile/unable to talk.
And location means nothing. In some of the newest, fanciest hospitals, staff is in the hall talking about Saturday night instead of working. That’s in CCU!
Family members and friends have to be there cuz in a hospital or nursing home setting, things change daily: the patient, the staff, germs in the place.
Without outside eyes, an institution exists in a vacuum and unfortunately, the patients who have no one, suffer even more.
Yeah, medical costs are sky high but the experience is more akin to a concentration camp. No wonder MRSA, antibiotic resistant bacteria is rampant. Spending a fortune doesn’t guarantee the institution cares about the individual hygiene of their patients. I’m sure you were charged for toothpaste and soap though.
They simply forget and since it's not their pain and maybe they're working a double, they have a lot on their mind.
Seriously, they should take reminder notes.
Because post it notes would require them to do something more. Of course, they’d charge the patient $20 per piece of post it.
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