Just ignore that dead woman in the waiting room

[Richard B the EMT]

I am posting this at about 8 PM. The 5 PM TV news reports said that 6 people, medical staffers and Health and Hospitals Corporation Police, have been fired.

How the hospital cops forgot they had video surveillance, I have no clue.

[CBEMT]

I love the fact that the crash cart was brought in and not touched again.

They have an ER just for mental illness?

Our main psych hospital's intake area is commonly referred to as "The ER." The sign over the door even says "Emergency."

As a result, people often show up there trying to get themselves admitted, often while high on way more than life. Even if they weren't, no one is admitted for treatment without medical clearance at a regular ER. As a result, I've taken many patients from there to the real ER, and then someone else brings them back later (sometimes days later) after clearance and depending on bed availability.

Busiest time for admits is Monday morning. It's awesome, you're transporting people who've spent all weekend on lockdown at the main receiving ER. They weren't pleasant or smelling fresh when they got there, nevermind 48-72 hours.

[zzyzx]

Geez, the exact same thing happened at King/Drew here in LA last year. Yesterday there was a story in the LA Times saying that the video from the security camera had just been released. Just as with the Brooklyn case, nobody attended to the woman after she collapsed. It's totally ridiculous that this could happen.

[jsadin]

I am posting this at about 8 PM. The 5 PM TV news reports said that 6 people, medical staffers and Health and Hospitals Corporation Police, have been fired.

Sounds to me like everyone stood around and went "hey, that's not my job!". Whatever the details are, the bottom line is this woman died in a hospital emergency room in front of a security camera. The hospital had better hope this woman has no relatives that feel like suing because they'll be screwed...

[Richard B the EMT]

The hospital had better hope this woman has no relatives that feel like suing because they'll be screwed...

Not gonna be the case. Lawsuit is already in progress, per the news reports.

[ConstanceGoodheart]

Staff ignores patients over here a lot...mostly the drunks. They tend to shove them into a wheelchair or bed, whichever is available and stick them in a corner.

I've transported a frequent flyer drunk before, and the cops blew off his symptoms initially just because the family admitted to him drinking during dinner, but he was having a full out cardiac episode. Because we knew his normal behaviour, when intoxicated, he wasn't normal to us. Call the medics, and work up it was.

[Richard B the EMT]

They have an ER just for mental illness?

With the usual apologies for my New York City/big city mind-set, most of the larger hospitals have a separate area, complete to access doors and intake area, for General ER, Psychiatric, Pediatric, Trauma, Replant (for traumatic amputations), Burn, and other heavy duty specialties.

Please note that I say "large", not necessarily "good". Kings County Hospital is large, and, usually, their ER and Trauma Centers are good. Psychiatric is actually in it's own building, the locally infamous "G" building. I say infamous, as the place has always had a bad reputation, possibly just because it IS a psychiatric facility. Bellevue Hospital has such, overall, despite it being the main Replant center for all 5 counties that make up New York City, because of it's past as one of the original psychiatric facilities in the city.