Escalation.
Things got worse in the morning. Nicole complained of increased bleeding and pain. “We’re going to the hospital, now!” she told me after hanging up the phone. She had spoken to her doctor, who was practicing at another hospital that day. Another emergency ward. Will it be like CHUL? or like CHRTR? On the road to Christ-Roy hospital.
The first thing that stroke me, was the parking lot. There are three types of parking lots: free, pay-as-you-go, pay-in-advance. This was a pay-in-advance. 1$/hour or 6$/whole day. Emergency wards are unpredictable. At the CHRTR we stayed for nine hours. At the CHUL for three. What should I do? No-brainer: I paid for the whole day. Will leave the ticket for the next patient in need.
I think it is wrong to charge hospital patients parking fees. Customers at shopping centers seldom have to pay for their parking, why should customers at the hospital do? Of all payment models pay-in-advance is the most inconvenient one, unless it was designed specifically to take advantage of patients in need that can’t really predict how much time they will need? Anyway, this is a battle to be fought another day.
The waiting room was crowded. The building was old, with some unergonomic design decisions dating back to the Seventies. Very dark, brownish, oppressing ceiling. But things were moving forward CHUL-like, not CHRTR-like. Despite system inefficiency (once again she had to register with the hospital and answer basic questions for about 15 minutes) service was excellent and Nicole could see her doctor within less than an hour. Things got worse indeed. She prescribed her pain killers and told her to fast and to be available on call for surgery at CHUL.
Waiting, again…
We did not do much for the rest of the day. The pain killers helped. Evening came and just when we started to cope with waiting another day, the phone call arrived and we were driving to the CHUL.