On the Warpath

I'll spare you some of the details, but I thought I would let you visualize Helen Kirkwood marching around the halls of Madigan Medical Mall with fire in her eyes.

After waiting a total of 1 1/2 hours, encountering an assistant who could neither make the scale work nor read the answers on my questionnaire and not having laid eyes on my caregiver, Ms. DelaRosa, I grabbed up my handbag, opened the door of the examining room and marched out!! I lurched to a stop at the receptionist's desk long enought to learn that I could find the chief of the Internal Medicine Clinic on the second floor. So up the stairs I went in search of Col. McGuire whose name was on the letter I had received directing me to make today's appointment.

Not knowing where I might find the elusive Col. McGuire, I decided to enter through the double glass doors identified as "Command something" and trod upon the flowers of the carpeted hallway looking for directions (remember this is the U.S. Army and there aren't many flowers so you know I was on hallowed ground). I stopped two young women, one in uniform and the other a civilian employee, for directions to Col. McGuire, and with a panicked look on their faces said they didn't know but they would take me down the hall to the secretary who would surely know. So they escorted me through some more glass doors to inquire as to the location of the colonel. Either the look on my face or the steel in my voice seemed to get everyone's attention and I think they were thinking to themselves they really wanted to get me out of there before I accosted some general. The nearest woman picked up the phone and quickly dialed the patient ombudsman, Ernestine, and handed the phone to me. I only got through about two sentences when Ernestine said she would come up and get me!!

All the while as we walked back downstairs, Ernestine was telling me how they want all their patients to be happy!! And it seems Col. McGuire was just the acting chief, and Col. Vilner was the current chief.............but he was in a meeting.

After speaking with Ernestine, and she in turn talking to her boss (who is one level down from the chief), the second in command said she was going out to the clinic to talk to Ms DelaRosa. She then returned to say both Ms DelaRosa, AND HER SUPERVISOR, Dr. Bales were in an office and invited me to go with her to speak to the two of them.

With some profuse apologies from my caregiver, and some further explanations from her supervisor, Dr. Bales (who had been my previous caregiver, and I LOVED him), I pretty much accepted apologies and explanations and returned to the clinic with the caregiver to proceed with the appointment that was to have taken place two hours earlier. Even at that, it wasn't a particularly stellar encounter, but it will suffice for now.

I understand all about busy doctors and clinics, but there had been some other poor communication prior to my appointment so I went into today's appointment already loaded for bear so as the clock kept ticking away, my blood pressure kept rising until I decided to take it upon myself to do some marching!

Fortunately, I had "dressed" for this appointment so looked pretty no-nonsense in black pants and shirt and aqua blue silk jacket. I would like to think that helped my credibility, and I thought it might be fun to put on the same outfit and walk down those same halls tomorrow to watch the looks on faces!!! Ciao