Left in the Lurch!

Left in the Lurch. - this happened not long before I retired a little over a year ago.  I bring it up simply to emphasize the stupidity of the system.

            Although our Saturday morning breakfast meeting has nothing remotely  to do with health care, the conversation frequently turns in that direction.  As the only physician in the group, by default I am the one they tend to turn to when issues related to heath arise.

            A couple of months ago, Jim was telling us about his 84 year old mother, who lives independently in another province and had been doing remarkably well until it was discovered recently that she needed a pacemaker.  Because she had no immediate family where she lives, Jim arranged for her to have the procedure done here, in London, so that she could stay with him and his wife, while she recuperated.

            She had her investigations and procedures carried out, and everything went according to plan with no setbacks.

            "My mother and I were very happy indeed with every aspect of the care she had received," Jim said. "When she was discharged from the hospital, I came to pick her up.  She had been placed on an anticoagulant and we were cautioned about interactions with other medications.   The nurse emphasized the importance  of initially having a weekly blood test to make sure that there was no bleeding.  So I explained that mother would be staying with me for a couple of weeks and asked if they could give me a requisition.”

            "We can't do that," the nurse said.  “You’ll have to get the family doctor to look after that for you."

            "The problem is, “said Jim, "that mother doesn't have a family doctor in this area, she's just staying with us for a couple of weeks.”

            "Well, I suppose you'll just have to get your Family Doctor to look after it."

            "There's the other problem," Jim said.  "My doctor is away for the next couple of weeks, but if you could order the test, and phone or fax the results to me, then I could phone it through to her doctor in Halifax and he could adjust the dose by phone, until she gets home."

            "I'm sorry, we can't do that," the nurse said.  She sounded genuinely sorry.

            "Well, what do I do then?"

            "I suppose you'll have to go to emergency or something," she replied.

            He really couldn't see his poor old mother, feisty as she is, sitting in an emergency room for four hours waiting to be seen, Jim said to me later.  He knew he'd be having breakfast with me on Saturday morning, and thought I wouldn't mind ordering the blood test and faxing him the results, so he could forward them to her doctor.  I was glad to help out, but I couldn't help feeling a little embarrassed that he and his 84 year old Mom had been left in the lurch by the Health Care Industry.
            Commonsense, is getting less and less common.