A hospital patient in Dartmouth, N.S., is speaking out after she was sent home eight hours after surgery for a suspected bowel obstruction, and was then forced to wait six hours in an ER again to be seen by a doctor.
Ashley Pastor was discharged Tuesday from Dartmouth General Hospital, but was back in the ER hours later when complications arose.
“You feel so unseen and it’s so incredibly frustrating, so unheard and you have no recourse,” she said.
On Monday, Pastor was brought by ambulance to the ER for severe abdominal pain and at around 9 p.m., was told she would be going in for emergency surgery.
The surgeon removed some bowel adhesions, which they determined was causing the pain.
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She was prepped to return home on Tuesday morning, but says she didn’t feel comfortable leaving so soon.
“I was concerned about the swelling. I was (worried) about the pain. I was (worried) that I hadn’t been able to void my bladder,” she said.
But when she went home, she says her abdomen swelled up to the size of half a volleyball. She called the hospital but was told she would have to return to the ER waiting room.
She waited six hours to see a doctor in the ER, but feels the entire ordeal could have been avoided.
“Given the fact that I had just been in the ER, having to be re-triaged, sit in a waiting room, and be reassessed for things that I’d already been assessed for just felt pointless,” she said.
“I’m a waste of resources and a waste time for everybody.”
In a statement, Nova Scotia Health said, “How long a person will need to stay in the hospital after surgery will depend on the patient, the type of surgery they had and how quickly they heal.”
“In many cases, patients are able to be discharged the same day as their procedure, even for significant procedures. Others need more time to recover in hospital according to the nature of the surgery and the person’s own health status,” the statement went on to say.
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