The ER needs an overhaul!

I am so frustrated right now. Princess Grabby Hands had a good fall and hit her head. After a short while she wasn't seeming right but I couldn't tell if it was because of the fall or if there could have been other reasons.

After debating back and forth between hubby and myself for about 20 minutes, we decided that I should take her in to the ER just to get checked out. A "better safe then sorry" moment.

I get to the ER and it's got some people in the waiting room but not super crowded or anything. I sign her name on the clip board and just ask the security guard if someone can just talk to me for a minute to make sure she doesn't need to be seen right away due to it being a one year old with a potential head injury which can go from bad to worse relatively quickly. He said he'd tell the nurse.

I wait and wait and wait and wait. 30 minutes go by and I don't even see a nurse anywhere. Yes, I'm still in the waiting room and nobody has looked at PGH (not even a quick flashlight in the eyes check). I finally see a nurse calling up the next person on the list who happens to be about four people ahead of us and it is the first person to be called since I walked in. He says he needs to use the restroom and I take that moment to go up and talk to the triage nurse.

The triage nurse looks at my daughter for two seconds, says she's alert, seems fine and we'll see her when we get to her. Ok....since when do you know all that from looking at a child for two seconds? She was over a foot away from her. I wasn't expecting for us to by pass everyone there but would it have hurt them to look at her for at least a minute or two just to determine if there was a more immediate need because of it being a head issue?

I sat back down and waited about another 20 minutes and nobody else was called so I just left. I figured at this point if my PGH was going to have anything big happen, it would have happened and she was getting mad at me for holding her because she wanted to go explore the waiting room. I figured she was fine at that point.

This is the second time in that ER that I felt completely neglected. I understand ER's are busy but when someone comes in with a child with possible head trauma they should at least pretend to care because that is nothing to fool around with.

I've been there before waiting to see if I broke my ankle and had nobody even offer me an ice pack after an hour and a half. Finally hobble down to the nurses station and there is like 20 people sitting around talking and laughing. AND NOBODY CAN EVEN COME TO MY ROOM WHERE THEY LEFT ME FOR OVER AN HOUR AND SAY THE DOCTOR IS BUSY BUT WOULD YOU LIKE AN ICE PACK????? That is uncalled for!

I told them I wanted to leave right then and wanted my discharge papers. I left a complaint then and so did my hubby when I got home. He called because he was so angry with them. This ER used to be pretty good. I don't know what happened in the last year but it went down hill fast!

Sorry not a funny post today but right now it's hard to do funny when I want to (as hubby puts it) get out my pitch forks and torches and go storm the place.

By the way, PGH seems fine and we did a whole head injury assessment after we got home and she didn't have anything that would indicate a serious injury at that point. She is resting comfortably and we are checking on her every 30 minutes to be sure she is fine.