Donville Inniss is one of the few Ministers of Barbados’ Cabinet handling the portfolio of Health in its history who does NOT have a medical background and yet is in charge of that key station in Barbados’ administrative infrastructure. It is a large bailiwick to oversee – there’s Drug Service, Polyclinics, Public Health Officers plus myriad more functions and departments & this does not even consider where Health can verge or bisect with Environment or Agriculture…
The QEH he described at Ellerslie Secondary for St Michael West Central did not match the reality or nightmare I was forced to endure for over a fortnight.
I recall when Barbados Free Press had a story about a mother who looked after her ill son at QEH, and I wondered despite the pictures if the story was true? Unfortunately, the answer is a resounding YES! This is another tale of mother and son, but the other way around – my Mom is diabetic and it was up to me to see she survived the QEH, because some of what they advised made sense and other times was so draconian as to be Kafka-esque, which is what led to my mother discharging herself a second time in the space of 16 days (Some were spent home, but the majority at Martindale’s Rd).
Throughout this article are the pictures to verify my tale of medicine as seemingly practised (sic) by Freddie Kruger… I read in the BFP item where the mother had to bring Intra-Site gel for her boy and hoard it so it would not get stolen, and would you believe the Inco-Pads which I brought for my Mom to use had disappeared when she was ready to leave? No wonder people try to avoid there, a business colleague told me, “I just learned of a guy who died {DATE REMOVED} after going in to have {GALL BLADDER SURGERY}! He got an infection and his organs failed…” Their resigned reaction is they expect no inquiry especially since the ex-patient was deemed an ‘ordinary Joe‘ – sigh!
Before I go any further, let’s allow Minister Inniss to give a statement, this is apart from relating how two new ambulances are coming – but at no time does he state if spare parts for old or new ambulances are forthcoming! Is that not essential for proper maintenance of these vehicles? I may be no mechanic, but even as a layman to this aspect, it would seem common sense that if you are ordering or being given two vehicles then you need to have essential backups, for when and not if, wear and tear rears its eventual head. Mr Minister, what else did you have to say?
Ain’t that great? Staff have a place to eat… So why on two occasions did my mother receive poultry, when she does not like to eat chicken? She and I specified she does NOT want that type of meat nor does she enjoy rice… I had to bring packets of oats and some yogurt tubs for her to have something for the Insulin to work on. If she did not want take a morning dose of 32 units as her blood sugar was between 2 or 3, the nurses would complain to the doctor who only then appears at my mother’s bed to admonish her that if she cannot abide by orders then she should GO, as she is “…wasting valuable bed space.”
Doctor’s words according to Mom, not her own – sounds like Scrooge before his transformation. What happened to patient’s rights? My mother can be contumacious, but I mean – OMG, her blood sugar is under 5 and you expect her to take Insulin just so, without eating? Because this was before breakfast! Ever hear of hypoglycaemic shock or even worse, diabetic coma?
If I recall correctly, near the night exit which is by the staff car park (Oh yes, you know how many times I had to park in the pasture next to the Martindale’s Road facility? With mud? Driving the car at an inch per hour, since if I move too quickly I may snap my chassis on the bumpy ground like high seas! Why, Mr Minister, did you not spend money for proper parking so friends and family can see their loved patients – what’s not cut off – with relative ease?) there is a sign with a list of Patient’s Rights, you better photo that before it’s removed but everywhere else in the world there are Patient’s Rights!
I suppose it was strange coincidence and not punishment after the fact for that incident (among others), when after my mother was bathed she then found out the hard way the nurses had not washed out her privates correctly and soap was left there which BURNED like fire on an oil-spill! They then took their sweet time in getting her water to rinse out the residue…
Speaking of heat, let’s go back to the video above, where Inniss mentions $125-thousand dollars was spent on new boilers… According to him, there were two old boilers being totally inert from 2004… So this means, A) why not activate the boilers already there? And then, B) If they were not used for the last five years, then, while they were bought under the BLP, it also means they were still unused during the DLP’s term! Is that then not a WASTE of $125-thousand just to get a round of applause, Mr Minister?
He says how more Dr’s and Nurses have been added to the Accident & Emergency, so when my Mom originally arrived on Whit Monday, why did she spend the night in A & E? Why did they not assign a ward to her immediately so she wouldn’t panic further and seek to discharge herself the first time? Maybe valuable bed space was taken by more cooperative guinea pigs patients?
But in the interests of being fair, let’s hear and see some more from this Harrisonian who appears to have let down Crumpton Street, he is claiming that senior citizens are to be valued?
IMHO? The orderlies are the most helpful, well informed and mannerly at the Queen Elizabeth Hostile, I mean, hospital! Many doctors appear, from the way they behave, as if they believe they are God’s brothers and sisters or Jesus’ cousins, yet if they were – would they not have more humility? What became of the Hippocratic oath? Did it fall in the Incinerator? Most nurses seem to feel they are the hostile Hospital’s Gestapo unofficial security…
I think Dale Carnegie or lessons in Diplomacy may be too far gone for those who really need it there – this view is not just me or my mother, two of her closest pals went to spend time with her and one of them e-mailed me “…{Bajan Reporter’s note: Maryam – not real name nor even correct sex} and I had a little run-in with one of the cleaners that showed up the insensitivity of the place. The nurses weren’t much more use; just as cold in their own indifferent way. At least on that ward.”
This was the same day I arrived at 12:Noon to exchange Mom’s dirty frocks for clean ones, there was no guest seating next to her and I needed a chair to rest the bag to do the switch. So I asked a nice young nurse and she readily complied with the furniture (It seems odd but they younger they are, the more likely they are nice but the older they are then more likely they will be hard-nosed and offhanded, you’d’ve thought the more time they knew the place the better they’d try), then a skinny older nurse asked her what is she doing, and she explained so Skinny Matron refuses me and barks that I can’t have that…
I told the b*tch of a so-called healthcare Professional that “...if I wanted to speak with a pig then I’d go to Southern Meats abattoir in St Philip;” I also roared that my mother better receive nothing but the best in care or else if anything suspicious happened ‘I’d lay a lawsuit in their crutch they wouldn’t believe!‘ My exact words, I’m afraid, at least I did not call her a b*tch to her face but I’m sure if she was like Sookie Stackhouse and could read my thoughts she’d probably be a pile of ash right then and there!
In referring back to the second video, Inniss says he will be looking at substance abuse yet he does not want to consider breathalysers? He says NGO’s must show what they’re doing to earn Government subventions yet he does not call them to account when their personal behaviour could endanger their professional stance?
When you take the words from Donville Inniss and juxtapose them with my current pictures of the QEH, and you take into account they have had almost THREE YEARS to start to truly right wrongs in not just the QEH, but Agriculture, Graeme Hall and so many areas – what have they been doing? Extended vacation? Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, and then more, yup – you guessed it… Talk. If this DLP Government were one of those toys with a vocal pull string, which was the IN thing of the 70’s for kids in the USA, then their chat-cord would be worn extremely thin!
Owen S. Arthur also let the QEH diminish in his time too (I say let him go along to Antigua for his consultancy and don’t waste his time meddling in things here again), it makes you wonder what would happen if either Rawdon Adams or Mia Mottley held the reins of the Barbados Labour Party? Would some kind of progress truly exist after all these decades? Since PEP and NDP are almost memories now, we have to work with what’s available at the moment, and make them ALL be held to account – no more letting it slide…
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