I give concierge Dr Heidarian a 5/5 review, but the rest of Eisenhower a very generous 2/5 for my…read moredad's recent stay.
EMS brought him from memory care to ER for altered mental state, weakness, and fever for suspected urosepsis. They brought him to a resuscitation bay, but his vitals were stable, except for mildly elevated troponins and assumed UTI. By the time I arrived after work, he had been assigned a room with telemetry. No transport aide was available and they needed the resuscitation ER room, so they left my dad unmonitored in a hallway for 20+ min. No staff checked on him in any way until transportation arrived.
He was admitted to 2S before shift change with no issues.
The next day I visited and saw one of his IVs was gone. My dad said they had spent a long time cleaning up the mess. There was still blood all over the patient phone and IV pump. His patient ID band was missing, which I meant to mention to the nurse but forgot. Surely they would notice when they needed to give meds? My dad was at his baseline, awake but with mild confusion to time and place (he knew he was in a hospital but not where). My dad mentioned he had had trouble sleeping the night before, which I mentioned to his nurse who put in a text to his concierge doctor. His doctor wrote an order for a mild nighttime medication. My dad's sepsis was under control with WBC trending down with IV antibiotics.
The plan was a couple days in the hospital until he could be switched to outpatient oral antibiotics back in memory care.
The next day when I visited, he was incredibly drowsy. When awakened for OT, he was combative. He had a different IV (a third one this visit) from the day before. He had an entire untouched breakfast at bedside as well as a full lunch in front of him. Apparently Eisenhower doesn't care if you eat. He ate when I helped him, but he was very drowsy. The blood on the phone and IV pump was still there from the day before. He still had no ID band, even though new antibiotics had been started and a new DNR band had shown up on his wrist. I mentioned it to his nurse, who very quickly came in with a band and said "here you go [first name]" with not even a confirmation from my dad.
He was extremely sleepy for no reason considering his bloodwork had stabilized.
His concierge doctor called me soon after saying that, for no known reason, another doctor had been consulted overnight when he became agitated. Although a nighttime med had been ordered by the concierge doctor, nursing staff did not give it. When he became agitated, they called the hospital overnight doctor instead of his 24/7 concierge doctor (through eisenhower!). This on call doctor gave him 3mg of Haldol, a medication with a black box warning against use in dementia psychosis. He has a concierge doctor who should have been consulted, but was instead given a dangerous medication (considering his size, age, and condition) by a doctor who should have never been part of his care.
While the plan was to discharge him tomorrow or the next day, this may now be delayed based on poor hospital communication and even worse judgement by on-call doctors.
And I can't wait to see if the patient phone has finally been cleaned of blood tomorrow, 3 days later.
Even if you have a 24/7 doctor, you are not safe. If you don't have a 24/7 doc, you for sure are not safe.
If you think this is a one-off, please consider the following stories:
- my mom was sedated for a pacemaker before they realized she hadn't signed consent
- my mom was left in an ER for 5+ hours with an absurdly dangerous sodium level of 110. Even though labs had been drawn, I was not told results but was instead told her cognitive changes were probably from parainfluenza and they even gave a bolus of NS. I wasn't told about her low sodium until many hours later when they transported her to icu. She has never regained her baseline cognitive function.
- when my mom was on isolation in the ER, staff came in to add a clean items into a dirty room.
- when my mom was admitted overnight to icu after a head injury and was confused, staff asked if I could stay overnight and babysit her because they did not have a sitter available. When I said I was not available, they then guilted me and told me then they would have to use chemical restraints (sedation)... because it was apparently my fault I was unavailable and they are poorly staffed? If something had happened while I was watching her, I'm sure they would have blamed me. The nurse told me chemical restraints was a worse healthcare option and it was my fault she had to use it. Having a parent in the ICU isn't stressful enough, so enjoy guilt from your ICU nurse!
I will say that the ER is pretty efficient, and you can be in and out within a few hours... but maybe that's because they miss important things like sodium levels of 110.
Only good thing is our $5k/yr/pt concierge doctor. Pay to play/live should be Eisenhower's motto.
