Originally Posted by shawano1
(Post 838013)
Thank you all for your responses. Let me tell you more of the story based on your responses.
On the first night, after taking her to TV ER and faced with an 11 hour wait, we did drive to Leesburg, because one of TV nurses said that Leesburg had pediatric care. When we got to Leesburg, we were faced with the same thing. The check in nurse said that they, too had an eleven hour waiting list. So we returned home, and gave our infant granddaughter acetaminaphin and put her to bed.
The next morning, I went to the TV Regional Hospital's Urgent Care across the street, and it wasn't open until 7 or 8 a.m. When I talked to one of the nurses about my sick granddaughter, they said that the ER is the place to go to receive a chest x-ray. That they would not have been able to help her. I then called around to various clinics and found one on HWY 466 and Morse that said they would be able to perform a chest x-ray on a toddler. Going back to our story, by then our granddaughter's fever had broken, so we went into a wait and lets see how she responds mode. Again, because of insurance coverage issues that only allowed for ER coverage pointed us to the ER or out of pocket expenses. By bedtime, our granddaughter was still very congested, but no fever. Our daughter wanted to take her into the ER for a chest x-ray, so I scouted TV ER for waiting time, and again it was five hours on the second night. We thought it would be better to wait until morning instead of having this toddler endure five hours of waiting in an ER waiting room. If no improvement overnight then we were going to take her to TV ER or to the walk-in clinic mentioned above. It ended up being TV ER on Saturday morning, and after an hour and a half wait, she received treatment in an open hallway, with no chest x-ray. We did receive an anti-biotic prescription for an ear infection. Hopefully, it will address the chest congestion, too.
In conclusion, a 24-hour Urgent Care would not have helped. They didn't do x-rays. Leesburg, was just as crowded as TV. Seasonality, has minimal blame. Going back to my original post, I needed ER care last August. I went to Urgent Care across the street, and once they heard pulmonary embolism, they whisked me to TV ER. There I waited nine hours for treatment, which ended up being an ultrasound and some blood work. When I asked personnel at TV ER why such poor service, they said that more snowbirds are becoming full-time residents that the ER can't handle summertime demand anymore either. As for people going to the ER that didn't need to be there and cause this problem, all I ask for those off-the-cuff flippant responses, is just go to TV ER some night. Pick any night, at any time of the year, and see the misery in all of the faces, and you will understand my outrage toward TV planners of how poorly they planned for this critical need. They do a great job in creating all kinds of availability for new housing, but missed terribly in this area. I pray that none of you ever has to go through what we and all of the others in that ER waiting room has gone through.
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