Sunday, September 8, 2002
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Sunday, September 8, 2002 |
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Recent hospital experiences
By MARY
JANE HOLT
It is Saturday morning, Aug. 31. It has been the most trying month of my life. Perhaps I have never known such anger and pain as I have known in recent weeks. It is good to be letting go of both. It is good to know many of you have prayed for me. I have known anger because of the inexcusable care and treatment (or lack thereof) that I received at Northside Hospital. My room was dusty and dirty and the majority of the staff reeked of strong and assorted fragrances. Such an environment can be potentially deadly to someone who is as allergic as I am. My family had to care for me most of the time because so few fragrance-free "nursing professionals" could be found. For those of you who may not know, nurses are taught in school not to wear fragrance. Fragrance can be extremely offensive to a patient who is already sick and nauseated. When I am well and strong again, and I will be, I intend to mount a national campaign for fragrance-free hospitals. Thankfully, the worst is over for me, but as I sit here this morning, name after name of former patients I have cared for over the years come to mind patients who could not tolerate strong odors, chemicals and assorted fragrances. You may even recall a time when you have had a virus or a headache and how certain odors and fragrances were offensive to you. As today's practice of medicine continues to evolve, it is important for medical professionals to constantly remind themselves to "first, do no harm." The fragrances worn by hospital staff have to go. I invite you today to call your local hospital and inquire what the policy is regarding staff wearing fragrance. Do it before you or your loved one is subjected to the added discomfort of such strong and assorted smells. I was released from Northside Aug. 12 only to be admitted to Fayette Community Hospital Aug. 15 with serious complications from the surgery. I credit the doctors and nurses at that little southside community hospital for saving my life. From the ER, to Radiology, to ICU, to the floor, they did it with compassion (yeah, loads of it!), medical competency, and yes, in a clean and almost fragrance-free environment. There are no words to express my thanks. I made the mistake of asking one doctor if I could write about him. He was embarrassed and indicated that he would rather I did not, so I didn't ask anybody else. You see, there was one doc who cared for me at Fayette who I'd already decided that I must tell you about. His name is Dennis Choat, MD, a board certified colon and rectal surgeon. Since I felt like another colon and rectal surgeon had just dropped the ball in a big way during the previous week, you can only imagine how nervous I was about letting him care for me. Yet, in Dr. Choat I discovered something wonderful and fairly unique among surgeons. With patience and compassion, he listened to me and my family. He observed my needs on many levels and responded appropriately at all times. Such a response can be unusual for a specialist of any kind and extremely rare for a specializing surgeon. Now, I don't mean that too critically, I really don't. We all have our various gifts and we all must use them as we are called to use them. It's just that when I was a little girl, in the old country church in which I grew up, we sometimes sang a song with a line or two that warned us not to be "so heavenly minded as to become no earthly good." It is my opinion, as both a professional nurse and a lifelong patient, that physician specialists can sometimes become so specialty minded as to render themselves of no systemic good to their patient. When any caregiver forgets that the one in his or her charge is a whole person with many complex needs, that caregiver loses his or her edge. I discovered that Dr. Choat has a phenomenal edge. I did try to ask him about it one day, but he blushed and murmured something about if he really had an edge, he probably owed it to his wife, who is an internist. "She keeps me updated on things in her field," he said. That may be, but I saw far more than a keenly updated medical mind in this doctor. I saw qualities I wish could be cloned and shared. I am truly indebted to him and everyone at Fayette Community Hospital for helping me get on this new road to recovery. I have been home now since Aug. 27. It is good to be back at the keyboard. Thank you for your prayers. God heard and continues to answer daily. Life is good.
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