I wonder if the Emergency Room staff at Surrey Memorial Hospital dream about people slumped over in chairs, cross-armed, shoes off, eyes bleary or shut, desperate.
The waiting is iniquitous; care-givers ambling here and there. This place truly is a disaster zone.
We came in at 7:30 p.m; it鈥檚 now 2:09 a.m. When somebody finally gets called, it鈥檚 like they鈥檝e won the lottery. Some people get this shocked yet also smug look 鈥� I鈥檓 sprung from purgatory but you鈥檙e not. Enjoy your hell clock.
But they don鈥檛 know, not yet.
The thing is, there鈥檚 truly nothing at all funny about this abomination disguised as a public health care system. I sit in my chair, legs pins and needles, wondering how people come to work here each day with a sense of pride.
At one point, we are told, there was only ONE (1) doctor available in all of SMH ER.
On occasion, we see letters to the editor singing SMH鈥檚 praises. I swear, these must come from an imaginary place where nice things happen even to nice people.
Enter, line up, vitals. Sit down, triage, sit back down, wait-t-t-t. Get called in through some doors 鈥� aha! This is where health care lives. Preliminary assessment. Wait-t-t-t-t. Get called in through more doors, to room 14 鈥� whoa! See familiar faces from that bygone era of purgatory. 鈥淵ou haven鈥檛 been seen by a doctor yet?!鈥�
Reminded me of that Monty Python sketch, where a sultry housewife greets a milkman at her front door and leads him to a room upstairs. He enters, thinking he鈥檚 going to get lucky, and she locks the door behind him. To his horror, the room is full of long-bearded fellow milkmen and the skeletons of those she ensnared before them.
You think this can鈥檛 be real, can it?
You think, if I were intelligent I鈥檇 part with this madness. The reason you came for help in the first place begins to elude you, you鈥檙e so tired. But now you see it more as an investment and resolve to pursue it to its conclusion.
Saw a unicorn 鈥� I mean, doctor 鈥� at 5:20 a.m. who snarked at us for standing in the hallway. We replied we鈥檙e not waiting in room 14 anymore because this guy hopping around like a crane fly had turned it into his private den of chaos.
This column has been an open letter to you, Surrey NDP MLAs: SHAME.
I on Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke deciding that the City of Surrey needs to step up and do something to fix Surrey鈥檚 health care crisis, although it鈥檚 the provincial government鈥檚 responsibility.
Man-o-man, I get it Brenda, I get it; the scales have fallen from my eyes. I鈥檓 a believer.
Until it鈥檚 fixed, I wouldn鈥檛 go to SMH ER for help if my skull fell out of my head.
