Author’s Note: You can read a brief account of my emergency room experience here
It’s been nearly a month since my visit to the emergency room at Bethesda Suburban Hospital and the bills have started to arrive. I’ve had a couple of chats with the hospital, the radiologist’s billing department (in India, of course), and the trauma physician’s office. They’ve been interesting enough that I felt I should start writing about them. This post is the first in a series about what I’m calling Whatever You Can Afford.
To kick it all off, I should probably relate the following exchange I had with the account department before I was allowed to leave the hospital:
After waiting in a room for nearly an hour and a half after being x-rayed and cat-scanned, a cheery young blonde woman with glasses came in with a clipboard to take down my name and address. She asked for a photo ID, which I had, and dutifully started to copy down the information from it when I informed her that most of it, including my last name and address are no longer up to date. After filling in the updated information myself, I handed her back the clipboard along with my ID and she bounced off with both after announcing that she’d be back shortly.
30 minutes later, a not-so-cheery, shortier, stockier blonde woman with glasses came back with a clipboard bearing the same form with the incorrect information copied down from my driver’s license and my maiden name misspelled as Rodriguz. She asked me to sign the form and I refused because neither my name nor my address was correct. I asked her what happened to the form I had just filled out.
“I don’t know!” she huffed, waving the clipboard at me “Someone just dumped this on my desk! I’ll correct your name – we just need you to sign it.”
After receiving reassurance that the information would be corrected in their system and I would be receiving a correct ID bracelet after signing, I signed the form. In return, I received a withering glower and my driver’s license before she turned on her heel and walked away.
Shortly thereafter, a nurse came in and asked me sign the release papers, which included pages that stated I had received and understood instructions for treating my various wounds (mostly skin abrasions). I told her I had not received treatment for the huge scrape along my jaw or the abrasions on my back and elbow and I certainly hadn’t received any instructions. I also noticed that the forms had been made out to Christiniana Suzuki, which is also not my name. Her explanation?
“The doctor has some dyslexia.”
She didn’t offer to have it fixed nor did she entertain my concerns about the hospital possibly losing my records because no one could recover them under my true and legal name but she did wipe my facial wounds with antibacterial ointment and advise me to take some Advil sooner rather than later. I asked her about the results from the x-rays and the CAT scans (since no one had told me yet) and she said that they showed I had a contusion. Wayne asked her if I also had a concussion and she nodded yes and then no and then seemed confused about which I had. She helpfully added that I could pick up my records before I left from the Records Office, which I did.
“Hey, look, they gave you a sticker,” said Wayne, looking over as I got into the cab home.
“Where?” I asked, peering down into my paper hospital shirt, “Oh, that’s the sensor thing from when they had me hooked up to stuff. Here’s another one. And another one. And two more down here.” I don’t know what these things are called but somehow I had managed to leave the hospital with five round sensors still stuck on my chest. I had no idea what they were until looking through the x-rays later that night.
The records are actually pretty cool – I was able to receive all of my CAT scans and x-rays, along with the radiologist’s readings on a disc. To be honest, the real reason I wanted my records was to see if I could tell if I had broken a rib a couple years earlier in a nasty fall down some stairs. Alas, the records were of no use to me in this regard but, as I would find out later, proved pretty handy otherwise.
Stay tuned for the next chapter in the Whatever You Can Afford: The First Bill.
1 Comment:
I just wanted to attest to the accuracy of this description and say that in addition, it’s much more entertaining to read about than it was to experience.
While I’m clearly biased: you are such a good writer. I really enjoy the perspective you bring to life and am glad that you are sharing it with the rest of the world.
Posted by Wayne Moses Burke on 22 June 2010 @ 15:18pm