A night at 37 Hospital
I thought me lying in a public hospital and having surgery was my worst nightmare until Giovanni got very sick and we had to go to 37 Hospital. Giovanni hadn't been feeling well all weekend. In fact I thought he was tired from the party we went to on Saturday. Sunday he was too quiet and not his usual self. Monday he had a serious seizure that lasted a total of 20mins (my poor gio) worried as I was I informed the doctor and gave him his medication. Tuesday afternoon he had another long severe seizure but this time developed a high temperature. No amount of sponging helped. And even the suppository didn't bring the temperature down. Our usual pediatricians funny enough were both outside the country. So we had no choice but to go to a private clinic in East Legon.
We saw a doctor at Acacia Clinic (Thanks to an amazing friend Vanessa who helped us get in touch with him), he was very helpful and referred us to 37 hospital. What I'm about to tell you will begin as a marathon but in the end God reigns. It was drizzling by the time we arrived at 37 (Giovanni, my mum and I) and we walked hurriedly to the pediatric emergency. The doctor at the private clinic(God bless his heart) already put an IV line through Giovanni's leg so he saved us so much trouble. We got to the emergency and my mother was immediately sent to records to go and do a file for Giovanni. This took an hour. While we waited the doctor took our medical history down, which also took forever (not his fault at all, with gio's condition, the medical history is long). After paying at records and getting a card for Giovanni, we were finally assigned a bed, my mother was sent again to the pharmacy to buy some drugs, this time the pharmacy was just round the corner. We had to do a full blood count therefore withdraw blood from Giovanni. My poor booboo was pricked several times (again not the doctor's fault: Gio's veins are very thin) I was crumbling as they did it, they eventually pulled me away because of all my shouting and wailing. While all this was going on, a gentleman brought his toddler in who was bleeding from his penis because a school mate had hit him in the groin and the teacher didn't notice it was that serious until the boy went home in the eveing and started bleeding. Sad but these things happens. Horried by listening to his story, I was worried as I had never been to the emergency section with Giovanni.
Anyway, we finally went to the bed assigned to us after hearing my poor Giovanni scream and cry, and low and behold the bed looked terrible. Bedsheet was stained and looked used. The nurse assured me that wasn't the case. I however put a clean receiving cloth from home on it before putting Giovanni on it. I was asked to go pick the blood test results at midnight. At that point, my mother and sister Gerry had to leave and also get some rest.
At the beginning, I thought that mother's weren't allowed to sleep by their children at 37, so I took a plastic chair to "sit sleep" in. And of course you can just imagine the mosquitoes (not as bad). We really had no choice, better to be in a public hospital than private just in case anything goes wrong, especially with all his complications, I just didn't want to take any risks.
We could seriously do better for the public hospitals. The pediatric ward is run down, no proper incubators meanwhile I saw about 3 premature babies there. It's really heartbreaking. You could however see that people had been donating stuff to improve the emergency ward. Place was fully air-conditioned, which meant less mosquitoes, but I think on our first night there was a problem so the air conditoners weren't working on one side of the room.
At 1am he woke up and temperature was high, sponged him and fed him. In fact sponged him several times up until 4am. I was supposed to collect the lab results at 1am but I had to wait as I didn't want to leave Gio and the nurses were busy seeing to the premature babies.
In the morning I went to the lab to get his lab results, and the gentleman at the counter told me I should drop it in a box and wait for my turn. Meanwhile he was receiving collection slips from other people and giving them their results yet told me to drop mine in a box. I did so and after 10mins of nothing happening I approached him and asked what was going on. He told me results collection was at 11am. My face dropped. I made him aware that I was on admission with my son and I had left him all alone in the ward to come and collect lab results that the doctor would need it at 8am this morning. Shouldn't people on admission at the emergency unit be priority. I was really upset but this was no time for me to display my frustration so I stood there patiently and prayed. After a good 45mins in total I was finally given my results. You have no idea the insults that flew out of my mouth for that gentleman, the insults stayed in my head and were mumbled quietly on my lips but of course not to his hearing. Sometimes I get so unlucky and always fall upon unhelpful and inconsiderate people. Giovanni was still sleeping peacefully just as I left him. I don't know whether to call this corruption or sheer dishonesty. And this is what is rotting are system currently. People never want to do things legitimately and I don't blame them at all, because when you do things the right way here it usually doesn't go well for you.
Apart from the dishonest incompetent lab guy, what the problem is at 37 is the lack of facilities and the bureaucratic way of going on admission in an emergency situation. It took one whole hour to register Giovanni and get his card, I don't want to imagine what would have happened if he hadn't been stabilized by the doctor at the private clinic before arriving at 37. The doctors and nurses I saw were all good but they lacked facilities. When it was time to examine Giovanni's ear, the doctor searched everywhere for the ear instrument (don't know it's medical name) and he couldn't find one. No ear instrument at a pediatric emergency unit? Hmm. Or I could assume there was only one for the unit. Simple first aid of paracetamol syrup was finished and I was obliged to borrow from a kind patient as the pharmacist had gone for a short break and we couldn't wait for him.
The pediatric emergency unit lacks a lot of facilities and if anyone wants to do something, come and see the nurse in charge here and ask. We were lucky to get a bed for Giovanni. Several premature babies but I'm seeing them in makeshift incubators with blue light and hospital cloth/bedsheet hanging around them. The beds are in bad shape, the side tables are rusty and barely have wheels. It's great unit and I think more can be done to help them. The doctors and nurses there are great, but the facility does not favor them. To be frank it's better than place but why settle for just ok if we can make the place better?
Discharge was only long because the person handling us (don't know whether it was a nurse because she was in uniform) didn't know what she was doing and couldn't tell me that she didn't know but rather kept our file and kept us waiting from the time I handed her the file at 10am all the way to 12.30 when I finally decided to go tackle her for it and give it to a doctor to tell me why it was so difficult to discharge us.
Quite a number of nurses read Giovanni's file and came to ask me questions. He is indeed a special child to arouse such curiosity.
Again I would say the nurses and doctors treated us pretty well. I only pray 37 being one of the main public hospitals gets enough facilities and fixes their administrative issues to cater to the Ghanaian citizen better.
We saw a doctor at Acacia Clinic (Thanks to an amazing friend Vanessa who helped us get in touch with him), he was very helpful and referred us to 37 hospital. What I'm about to tell you will begin as a marathon but in the end God reigns. It was drizzling by the time we arrived at 37 (Giovanni, my mum and I) and we walked hurriedly to the pediatric emergency. The doctor at the private clinic(God bless his heart) already put an IV line through Giovanni's leg so he saved us so much trouble. We got to the emergency and my mother was immediately sent to records to go and do a file for Giovanni. This took an hour. While we waited the doctor took our medical history down, which also took forever (not his fault at all, with gio's condition, the medical history is long). After paying at records and getting a card for Giovanni, we were finally assigned a bed, my mother was sent again to the pharmacy to buy some drugs, this time the pharmacy was just round the corner. We had to do a full blood count therefore withdraw blood from Giovanni. My poor booboo was pricked several times (again not the doctor's fault: Gio's veins are very thin) I was crumbling as they did it, they eventually pulled me away because of all my shouting and wailing. While all this was going on, a gentleman brought his toddler in who was bleeding from his penis because a school mate had hit him in the groin and the teacher didn't notice it was that serious until the boy went home in the eveing and started bleeding. Sad but these things happens. Horried by listening to his story, I was worried as I had never been to the emergency section with Giovanni.
Anyway, we finally went to the bed assigned to us after hearing my poor Giovanni scream and cry, and low and behold the bed looked terrible. Bedsheet was stained and looked used. The nurse assured me that wasn't the case. I however put a clean receiving cloth from home on it before putting Giovanni on it. I was asked to go pick the blood test results at midnight. At that point, my mother and sister Gerry had to leave and also get some rest.
At the beginning, I thought that mother's weren't allowed to sleep by their children at 37, so I took a plastic chair to "sit sleep" in. And of course you can just imagine the mosquitoes (not as bad). We really had no choice, better to be in a public hospital than private just in case anything goes wrong, especially with all his complications, I just didn't want to take any risks.
We could seriously do better for the public hospitals. The pediatric ward is run down, no proper incubators meanwhile I saw about 3 premature babies there. It's really heartbreaking. You could however see that people had been donating stuff to improve the emergency ward. Place was fully air-conditioned, which meant less mosquitoes, but I think on our first night there was a problem so the air conditoners weren't working on one side of the room.
At 1am he woke up and temperature was high, sponged him and fed him. In fact sponged him several times up until 4am. I was supposed to collect the lab results at 1am but I had to wait as I didn't want to leave Gio and the nurses were busy seeing to the premature babies.
In the morning I went to the lab to get his lab results, and the gentleman at the counter told me I should drop it in a box and wait for my turn. Meanwhile he was receiving collection slips from other people and giving them their results yet told me to drop mine in a box. I did so and after 10mins of nothing happening I approached him and asked what was going on. He told me results collection was at 11am. My face dropped. I made him aware that I was on admission with my son and I had left him all alone in the ward to come and collect lab results that the doctor would need it at 8am this morning. Shouldn't people on admission at the emergency unit be priority. I was really upset but this was no time for me to display my frustration so I stood there patiently and prayed. After a good 45mins in total I was finally given my results. You have no idea the insults that flew out of my mouth for that gentleman, the insults stayed in my head and were mumbled quietly on my lips but of course not to his hearing. Sometimes I get so unlucky and always fall upon unhelpful and inconsiderate people. Giovanni was still sleeping peacefully just as I left him. I don't know whether to call this corruption or sheer dishonesty. And this is what is rotting are system currently. People never want to do things legitimately and I don't blame them at all, because when you do things the right way here it usually doesn't go well for you.
Apart from the dishonest incompetent lab guy, what the problem is at 37 is the lack of facilities and the bureaucratic way of going on admission in an emergency situation. It took one whole hour to register Giovanni and get his card, I don't want to imagine what would have happened if he hadn't been stabilized by the doctor at the private clinic before arriving at 37. The doctors and nurses I saw were all good but they lacked facilities. When it was time to examine Giovanni's ear, the doctor searched everywhere for the ear instrument (don't know it's medical name) and he couldn't find one. No ear instrument at a pediatric emergency unit? Hmm. Or I could assume there was only one for the unit. Simple first aid of paracetamol syrup was finished and I was obliged to borrow from a kind patient as the pharmacist had gone for a short break and we couldn't wait for him.
The pediatric emergency unit lacks a lot of facilities and if anyone wants to do something, come and see the nurse in charge here and ask. We were lucky to get a bed for Giovanni. Several premature babies but I'm seeing them in makeshift incubators with blue light and hospital cloth/bedsheet hanging around them. The beds are in bad shape, the side tables are rusty and barely have wheels. It's great unit and I think more can be done to help them. The doctors and nurses there are great, but the facility does not favor them. To be frank it's better than place but why settle for just ok if we can make the place better?
Discharge was only long because the person handling us (don't know whether it was a nurse because she was in uniform) didn't know what she was doing and couldn't tell me that she didn't know but rather kept our file and kept us waiting from the time I handed her the file at 10am all the way to 12.30 when I finally decided to go tackle her for it and give it to a doctor to tell me why it was so difficult to discharge us.
Quite a number of nurses read Giovanni's file and came to ask me questions. He is indeed a special child to arouse such curiosity.
Again I would say the nurses and doctors treated us pretty well. I only pray 37 being one of the main public hospitals gets enough facilities and fixes their administrative issues to cater to the Ghanaian citizen better.
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