Woman with burst appendix says hospital downplayed complaint
Leevee Nowdlak says she called Stanton three times with 'extreme' pain and was instructed to take Tylenol and lay down
Jessica Phillips
Northern News Services
Friday, April 15, 2016
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A woman who says she called the hospital three times in "extreme" pain and was told to rest and take Tylenol, learned later the pain was from a life-threatening burst appendix.
Leevee Nowdlak says she called Stanton Territorial Hospital three times beginning at 5 a.m. March 7 with a bad pain in her side, which turned out to be a burst appendix. She says each time she was told by the night nurse on duty to rest and take Tylenol. The hospital declined comment due to patient confidentiality. Nowdlak says she doesn't intend to file a complaint. - Jessica Phillips/NNSL photo |
It started around 5 a.m. on March 7.
"I started getting really bad pains. I thought it was just on my side, like on my hip," said Leevee Nowdlak, who says she then looked up Stanton Territorial Hospital in the phone book and spoke with a night nurse, who picked up the phone.
"She didn't ask where my pain was, I told her where my pain was."
The night nurse told her to take two Tylenol and rest, she said.
"Half an hour later after I took the two Tylenol. The pain was extreme," Nowdlak said.
"So I called back and all she said was 'We can't do anything for you. Take two Tylenol and rest.'"
She said because she had already taken the Tylenol, she didn't take more.
Nowdlak said she called back about 6 a.m. and says she was told the same thing.
This time, the nurse added that if she wanted an ambulance she had to call it herself.
"I was crying because I was in pain," Nowdlak said.
I decided half an hour later to call the ambulance and the ambulance came within five minutes."
The paramedic immediately asked her where her pain was, she said. After she told him it was her side, he asked her if she had ever had her appendix out and she said, "no."
"I thought my pain was in my hip area but when the young man was asking me questions he started pinching my lower abdomen," she said. "That was when I started to feel it and we got to the hospital."
She said she was told by a doctor that if she hadn't had gotten to the hospital when she did she would have died.
Despite her dissatisfaction, Nowdlak told Yellowknifer she doesn't intend to file a complaint.
"It's over and you can't turn back time," she said.
David Keselman, director of patient services, said he couldn't comment directly on this incident due to patient confidentiality but said nurses don't give advice over the phone.
"The general approach from a nursing perspective is that nurses do not give medical advice over the phone." Keselman said.
"It is not our practice, it is not within the scope of practice of a nurse to provide advice over the phone. The nurses are taught and always directed that if individuals call with health concerns or any health-related matters that they need to ask the individual to either see a physician or come in and be assessed."
He said that without a proper assessment and without a health-care provider seeing that individual face-to-face and making clinical decisions, advice over the phone is not what nurses are allowed to give.
He said there is a process for complaints about patient care.
"If the individual has staff concerns they should really contact the patient representative," said Keselman.
"I think that really is the only appropriate way we try to deal with complaints and concerns and lead to improving positive outcomes."
