"Triage, response time, available beds and staff"

I was taken by ambulance to peel health campus with strong abdominal pain, fever and chills. On arrival, it was determined there were not enough beds to put me in ED so I was transferred to a wheel chair even though it was very difficult for me to be in a seated position. I arrived alone as my partner needed to stay at home with the kids and to be honest were not expecting things to be as serious as it turned out to be. I was parked in a corner as the waiting room was full.

Approximately half an hour later my name was called and I was left in the position of having to try to make my way to the desk for triage on my own. I was asked to confirm my name, date of birth, address and next of kin and a run down of what was going on. I said I was there for severe abdominal pain and a possible new allergic reaction to codeine. The triage nurse told me to take a seat at which point I had to tell them I think I may have accidentally urinated on the seat I was sitting and then I had to make my own way back to the wheel chair I was seated in by myself. Over the next 3 hours no one checked on me except another patient who had seen that I was sitting silently but had been having obvious and regular cramping episodes.

Approximately 3 hours later, I started to get very severe chills, uncontrollable cramps and had started to lose control of my bladder completely. I had to ask a patient to get help. It appeared the fellow patient had a lot of trouble trying to get someone's attention and then they had to really stress to them that it was an emergency. By this stage I recall the entire waiting room were calling for help. Someone from behind the desk eventually came to check on me and then they had to go get some medical staff to come and help which also took a few minutes. By this stage my chest felt like it was being crushed, I could barely breathe and barely communicate. I was literally begging for help as much as I could. By the time I was wheeled through the door from emergency I was not really able to communicate at all and they had trouble identifying who I was because I did not have an id band and had never been given one during triage. I was only able to barely whisper my first name and I believe the staff had trouble understanding me because they kept asking me to try to repeat it. I was wheeled to bed and asked to get on it which was incredibly difficult although I managed to get on there with help.

Next thing I remember there are a lot of alarms going off things are going black and I hear what think sounds like words to the effect of crash carts, possible overdose, possible allergy reaction and then staff questioning what to use and having to make a judgement call and pushing something through. I vaguely remember someone possibly saying they weren't sure I was going to make it and a lot of sullen attitudes afterwards with them saying there was anything else they can do now. No one would tell me what was going on. So from my point of view I honestly felt like I was in my last few hours and will admit to becoming hysterically emotional begging for them to call my partner in as soon as possible and make sure they arrive safely. They appeared to be keeping me away from my bag that had my phone in it so I was unable to call them myself. I was having to go through something extremely traumatic with little to no explanation only for them to turn around and say none of it happened and it was all delerium. It also seemed like there was a lot of focus on whether I was going to regain cognitives and they appeared to me incredibly surprised I was able to say who I was, where I was, what day it was, an approximate time, recount what time I arrived, how long I had been in the waiting room and the time the escalation began as well as detailed events that had occurred at a gp office earlier that day.

I felt my care was extremely unsatisfactory in triage. As I understand it, patients in the waiting room told me that they had been told there was a 7 hours wait and they had already been there about 6 hours at that stage. While I was going to go for scans I managed to get my phone and call my partner to come in because from what I was hearing I believed things were not looking good for me. When they arrived my partner said they saw the actual waiting room banked with beds. while I was getting transferred to rivers suite I saw at least one case of two beds to Bay.

I feel the staff are doing the best they can with what they have and I believe what they have is next to nothing. In my opinion, there are nowhere close to being even half the amount of beds they need in emergency. Once on a ward I found things are even worse. It seems to me they are extremely short staffed and are doing long shifts with barely a couple hours before their next shift. I feel I could ring the bell but it could be a while before they get to me because it seems they have to see to 3 other patients before me because there isn't anyone else and if there is then it seems they are busy with their own patients in a similar situation. Not once have they complained but I believe I can see they are barely keeping their heads over water. In my opinion, this was the rule and not the exception in my stay.