Thursday, 1632:
An email message arrives from Stanford Hospital:
New Emergency Department Locations
With details on the new, separated Adult Emergency and Pediatric Emergency departments. Pediatric is in the old place; Adult is in the shiny new building.
Wish I'd known that 24½ hours earlier....
Tuesday, 0840:
I take my father to his primary-care department at PAMF, across the street from Stanford, so his PCP's PA (the PCP herself not being available on short notice) can review his status following the events briefly summarized last week. The PA agrees with my notion that a followup CT scan is due right-about-now, not the 5th of December. We make an appointment for 1300 Wednesday.
Wednesday, 1245:
The CT scan happens ahead of schedule.
Wednesday, 1450:
I get a call from the PA, who sounds alarmed. While the PAMF/Stanford connection allows exchange of medical records, it apparently doesn't allow exchange of CT imagery (in either direction, as we'll learn later), the radiologist has compared the new imagery to the Stanford radiologist's description of the situation on 01 Nov following treatment, and it appears that the hematoma is now larger.
After a bit of discussion, we come up with a plan: I'll call the Stanford neurosurgery department for advice; if they're not helpful, I'll take him to the Stanford ER again. I call neurosurgery, give lots of details, wait a while, and get a call back from the advice nurse, who, after some discussion, recommends a trip to the ER.
It's not dinnertime yet, so I put the day's evening geezer pills in a little bag (anticipating dinner in the cafeteria adjacent to the ER), forget my Kindle, bundle my father into the car, and head off.
Wednesday, 1600:
We arrive at the emergency department, and find that the sign now says "Pediatric Emergency", pointing us to a new address on Welch Road for Adult Emergency. Good thing this isn't the really urgent sort of emergency, but just something that seems to call for real-hospital resources (plus access to Stanford's neurosurgery department, being as they're the ones who treated him last month, and we think he should still be under warranty).
So we make our way around to the Shiny New Building whose grand opening was just about the time my father was last housed in the Grubby Old Building, just over two weeks ago. Find our way to the valet parking stand, load him into a wheelchair (since I figure it'll be more convenient that trying to keep track of his personal walker, besides which he moves rather slowly with the walker), hand over the car key, and enter the Big Shiny New Emergency Department Lobby.
Which, yes, is shiny and impressive and much more spacious than the old one. As is what we saw of the facility: triage rooms, treatment rooms, and radiology zone. Though some aspects of the layout seem somewhat questionable. Anyway:
As things progress, we learn that nobody, including the patient transport staff, knows the layout of the new building. Also, the automatic doors are brand new and haven't learned to do their jobs yet. Apparently a lot of other shiny new stuff isn't working so well either (as I discover when attempting to wash my hands using a state-of-the-art faucet).
Since Stanford doesn't have access to the imagery from the PAMF image scan (but I did bring a printed copy of the written report!), they decide to do a new one. Hey, at his age a little extra radiation dose is a lot less dangerous than a hematoma. So off through the maze to one of the three CT rooms. As I'm waiting in the hallway, I note that the interior of CT machine #3 is lit which a shifting-pastel-colored light. How cute. Then back through the maze to the treatment room and wait.
After a while, the ER doc comes in with a verbal report of the new results, and a printout of the previous results: the hematoma has actually shrunk a little, and there's no reason he can't just go home. Hurray!
... Er, wait. The previous results are dated 30 Nov, i.e., at the time he was admitted last time. Before the hematoma was drained, like. Can you just confirm that?
Yeah, apparently the format of medical records doesn't make it clear that he was treated at Stanford Hospital after his last admission via the Stanford Hospital Emergency Department, and that there are later CT scans from after the treatment. Off the doc goes in search of the regular-hospital CT-scan results.
Aaaand, it's increased in size since he was discharged. After a while, someone from Neurosurgery stops by briefly to announce that there's a procedure for dealing with this sort of slow leak; it involves a catheter and a dose of, I dunno, Radiator Stop Leak, or Liquid Duct Tape, or Krazy Glue, or something. Hey, if I can fix a laptop computer with JB Weld, why not fix a brain with Krazy Glue? Anyway, he says they need to confer further and they'll get back to us.
Much time passes. It gets to be closing time in that part of the emergency department, so we're moved to another part, and more time passes.
In the fullness of time, another doctor (I think from the emergency department, not from neurosurgery) informs us that the leak-stopping thing is done as an outpatient procedure, so it's time for us to go home, and Neurosurgery will be contacting us Real Soon Now to schedule it.
Various papers being signed, we proceed (with a nurse escort) back toward the entrance, where I anticipate complications, and (I mentioned questionable aspects of the layout?) it turns out I'm right. The only valet stand, see, is at the emergency entrance, which is around the corner of the building (some considerable distance in the early-morning chill) from the main entrance. The emergency entrance is connected to the waiting-and-triage zone by a security station with a guard and a metal detector, and the connection of that zone to the main facility is via a one-way door bearing laser-printed "NOT AN ENTRANCE" notices. No problem; the nurse's badge gets us into the triage area via another path. Then it's out to the valet stand to retrieve my car, back in through security again to retrieve my father, out again, and then get directions for returning to the road (the traffic patterns being highly nonobvious; the exit is marked "PARKING ENTRANCE").
Thursday, 0300:
Arrive home. No food since lunch; no sleep since, well, right about 23 hours ago. Eat a cookie, drink some water, and collapse in bed.
Friday, 1720:
Wrap up typing this. Still haven't heard anything from Neurosurgery about scheduling that outpatient procedure. Oh, well: guess I'll call them Monday morning. (Also still haven't heard anything back from them about moving up the 05 Dec follow-up appointments from last time, which ought to have been scheduled for, roughly speaking, 18 Nov.)
Afterthought: The neurosurgery department seems to have communication issues. Perhaps it was dropped on its head as a baby.
Why does the spelling checker think "hematoma" should be spelled "tomato"?
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