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Getting the treatment

By Peter Williams - posted Friday, 12 October 2007


I thought readers might be interested in my recent experiences at Belmont District Hospital (emergency outpatients department).

I was stricken with a sudden and unprecedented attack of renal colic - blockage of urine flow by kidney stones to the uninitiated - that completely laid me out and necessitated two visits to the Belmont hospital emergency department. It has been said (except by the ladies) that this affliction is the most painful affliction known, and I have no reason to doubt this view. Forget crucifixion - a ballsy martyr out to save the world would have opted for renal colic.

I would like to express my dissatisfaction with the treatment dished out by the staff (and policy makers) of the Belmont District Public Hospital, and to petition the readers to present a united front in outright condemnation of the methods adopted and imposed on hapless recipients such as myself. Allow me to tell my story, although readers should be warned that the story is not a pretty one.

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Upon staggering into the emergency reception centre, bent double and screaming in agony, I was immediately admitted to the emergency ward, thereby jumping the queue.

This is my first complaint. I should have been told to wait my turn. One sees so many complaints directed at waiting times in emergency departments that I felt left out, as it were. I had been admitted on the basis of need rather than procedure, thereby denying me the right to have my name in the newspapers and the opportunity to be interviewed by some feather-brained bimbo on commercial television. Why was I denied the opportunity to become a media tart?

After vomiting on the triage nurse I was immediately placed on a roller chair and transported at a run to a bed with spotlessly clean sheets, pillow case and so on, all fitted while I waited. This is my second complaint. Why was I denied the right to complain about the attention I was given and the hygiene? For that matter, why were my constant screams and demands to be euthanised ignored? Why was I subjected to immediate placement, rather than being left on a trolley somewhere? Again my rights to media attention were trampled on in the name of efficiency and procedure.

Upon being lifted onto the bed by a nurse about half my size I attempted, between spasms of agony, to remove my shoes. I was told “bugger the sheets - they will wash - it is you we are concerned about”.

Now I put it to you, is this fair? Why should my shoes, filthy dirty after staggering from the hospital car park through the rose garden at the front of the building, be allowed to add to the woes of the laundry contractor staff? Again, willful concern for the patient had been allowed to over-ride logistic considerations, and this on-going problem must be addressed. Urgently.

By this time I had a registered nurse, a trainee nurse, and a doctor at my bedside, thereby denying me the right to complain about being left for hours without attention.

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In no time at all I had a drip going, several injections, and an infusion of morphine - all carried out with new, sterile non re-useable equipment - a scandalous waste of money in itself. None of this was explained to me at the time, and this is another point that should be addressed. The fact that I was incoherent and virtually unconscious provides little excuse for such a clear disavowal of the “doctor/patient” relationship.

What happened to doctor/patient communication? Why was I denied the right to fully discuss the broad and on-going ramifications of my treatment and to consider other modality options? Why were my well known and publicly acknowledged rights to full consultation and direct involvement in my treatment denied me?

Why wasn’t I encouraged to visualise myself as being well and whole and thereby hasten my recovery? Why didn’t the two nurses join hands with the doctor and thereby amplify the healing force? Why didn’t the staff don white coats and stethoscopes as proof of their competence? Why wasn’t the laying on of hands modality invoked? Why was no healing crystal pyramid placed on my chest?

These oversights provide further egregious examples of the arrogance commonly displayed by the medical profession, and the total failure of the public hospital system to provide the necessary services, and to stay in touch with the needs of the general public.

Now comes the real heart of the issue - the very winter of my discontent with the treatment I received. By this time the morphine had kicked in, and I was in the position to offer some much needed advice to the medical staff. It saddens me to record that not only were no homeopaths consulted, but also that there seemed to be none on the staff of the emergency unit. There were not even any homeopathic medications available!

That’s right - no vial of 1000x fully sussed tincture of cat piss was on hand!! Such an oversight beggars belief and destroyed what little faith that I had left in the medical profession! Not only were the well documented homeopathic cures not available, but the doctor actually expressed the view that homeopathic medication was useless, with no curative power whatsoever!

I of course knew that one speck of monkey shit dissolved in a globule of water the size of the known universe would provide an instant cure for haemorrhoids, cancer, and every known sexually transmitted disease. I wondered at such ignorance.

What then I asked, of polarity therapy? Would a polarity therapy specialist be made available to brush away the magnetic field residues, and reconnect the magnetic flows across the nodes? To my horror the doctor claimed no knowledge of such a medical procedure!

Would then the house chiropractor be made available? Clearly the subluxations are out of alignment and spinal disorientation with the central force field had bought about this vexatious state of affairs. Imagine my horror when I was informed that there was NO SUCH PERSON! That’s right - a major public hospital with no in-house subluxation expert!

“What then of aroma therapy” I asked - “a whiff of essence of violet subservient to the spirit of Mongolian white rose could be just what I need!” Again - nothing but amused indifference!

I then pleaded for an exorcism. There seemed little doubt that an evil spirit had invaded my kidneys, and an exorcism could well sort the whole thing out. Again, crushing disappointment: none operated under the Medicare system. This in a modern, taxpayer funded general hospital!

The registered nurse even had the effrontery to tell me to “stop taking the piss” and that “the best we can do is a celebrant if you die” while she gave me another morphine injection, having taken time out at the end of a 14-hour shift from attending two heart attack victims, a traffic accident trauma, and someone who had foolishly fallen off a ladder.

Neither was there blessed relief from any highly qualified alternative medicine professionals, who have purchased their PhDs from the best non-accredited universities available.

“What happens next” I asked, shaking off my disappointment and despair. To my dumfounded horror all they could offer was an escorted ambulance ride to the John Hunter hospital for a CT scan! That was it! I was to be trolleyed into a fully equipped ambulance, with a personal attendant and a qualified ambulance driver, to be whisked off to a machine that, operated by a university qualified technician at 11pm, would immediately and painlessly photograph my internal kidney structure and provide a picture of the problem!

I was shattered! This was the final blow, and the final demonstration of a totally defunct public hospital system!

Not even a mention of re-aligning my bio-rhythms, no attempt to utilise qigong and the natural healing power of energy balance, no investigation of my blood-type reaction to my eating habits, no offer of Reiki therapy or yogic manipulation, no aura therapy (despite the obvious fact that my auras were completely rat-shit).

Can this horror story get worse? Yes!

Upon being delivered safely back to the emergency ward and again delivered into the hands of the well demonstrated incompetence and indifference of the ward staff, the worst happened! What more can they do to this unfortunate wretch I hear you ask?

Can you believe that I was denied SPIRITUAL SUCCOUR! How, I hear you ask?

NO GIDEON BIBLE ALONGSIDE THE BED!

That’s right! In the midst of my agony I was denied the WORD! I was denied the use of the Christian Science healing modality. I was denied the promise of the after life and the forgiving of my sins. In short, I was ruthlessly sacrificed on the altar of Mammon by this establishment conspiracy!

When I demanded absolution for being a rotten bastard all my life I was told to shut up! When the pain started up again and I requested that my auric lifeline be reconnected to the nethermost region of eternal bliss, I was only given another shot of morphine! When my blood pressure rose to dangerous levels I was given medication and denied chakra re-alignment - a therapy that would have immediately corrected the problem!

And so it went on - a continuous indictment of an ethically and morally defunct public hospital system - until at last I was pain free and safely home.

I urge the broader community to join me in a crusade - a crusade against the disgraceful standard of medical treatment presently available to the long-suffering public. Refuse to support a medical profession that relies on evidence; peer reviewed publications; ethical constraints; repeatable outcomes; and controlled experimental analysis. Deny the well documented proof of positive results and substantiated anecdotal evidence of the professionalism consistently displayed by overworked and dedicated hospital staff!

This is your right! Fifty thousand “new age” publications, any number of dick-headed greasy pole climbing tabloid/TV journos, and a plethora of ever increasingly moronic “celeb” magazines catering to an ever increasingly moronic clientele can’t be wrong! Go to it - by clinging to the past the future is ours! Link hands, form a Druidic circle, slaughter a chicken, get in touch with yourself, and Demand Your Rights!

I am happy to report that the “stones” were eventually “passed”, and I am fully recovered. I would also categorically state that I would willingly engage in discourse with two spotlessly clean, white shirted, basketball playing Mormons while enduring a 20 kilo cannon ball hanging from my testicles rather than go through it again.

I was going to say that I would rather shake hands with John Howard - however one must maintain some standard of ethical decency. Not even renal colic is that bad.

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About the Author

Peter Williams worked in the power industry initially as an electrician and then as a training officer. He later operated his own business and while doing so studied to obtain a B.A in Philosophy.

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