At the reception, parents waited 7 hours for help – I didn’t think I needed to bring a sleeping bag with a three-year-old with a fever.

To the reception area, with a sleeping bag?

“I didn’t think I should bring a sleeping bag to the hospital reception when I was three feverish years old,” Aistė joked in frustration after visiting the reception department.

According to the woman, I had to visit the reception of the Santara Children’s Hospital several times this summer. All procedures had to be waited between 6 and 7 hours with all procedures.

“The last time we arrived at the reception with a feverish and coughing child was around 6 pm, we waited about half an hour until the sister came to measure the child’s temperature, height and weight and told her to wait. Maybe 5 more parents with children were sitting together at the reception.

It is good that we had a drink and an apple, because with the child we were invited to a separate and isolated room only after waiting about 3 hours, where we were waiting for the doctor again ”, Aistė shared her unpleasant experience in the hospital. .

According to the woman, a resident doctor came to examine the boy.

He did an initial exam for three years: he asked about his lungs, measured his temperature, examined his throat, asked and advised him to have a blood test, but added that he would have to wait again. The woman clarified how long she would have to wait.

“The resident said that there is only one nurse who draws blood, so, I don’t know, it can take up to three hours. After half an hour we went out to ask the nurse how long to wait. She assured me it would be soon,” said the interlocutor.

Half an hour later, the blood was drawn and the father and son had to wait another hour for the results. The family returned home only after midnight, and heard a recommendation that if the boy’s condition worsened, he should see a doctor again.

“And I, as a mother, wonder why we have to wait so long for blood to be drawn and the simplest initial examination. No one seemed to be in a hurry anywhere. However, it is difficult for an adult to wait so many hours, much less for small children, ”the woman resented.

Hospital says it faces huge patient flows

We contacted Jolanta Normantiene, Head of the Communication Service of Clínicas Santara. According to the hospital representative, it is extremely difficult to comment on a situation in which it is not known when and to which room the patient arrived, what situation he was in at that time.

However, according to J. Normantienė, the flow of patients in the Santara clinics is high and increases especially on weekends, because primary health care institutions generally do not accept patients with acute illnesses.

Therefore, until the Children’s Emergency Department of the Children’s Hospital has to attend to patients from the surrounding areas (for example, Šalčininkai, Trakai, Varėna, Lazdijai, Pabradė, etc.) who do not have access to outpatient services due to services outpatients, it will take a long time after the assessment of the condition, wait your turn, especially if it will be a weekend, a holiday, as well as usually on Mondays and Fridays after 15.00 to 16.00.

“Most of the large hospital admissions have primary patient assessment scales (TRIAGE procedure), which determine the urgency and the sequence of consultations for the patients who are admitted. The most seriously ill patients with unstable conditions are always consulted first. In cases where the patient’s condition is not threatening and there are more patients with a more serious condition, the waiting time is longer ”, it was written in the response about the situation.

In addition, according to J. Normantienė, attention should be paid to the fact that strict epidemiological requirements are observed in the hospital. After waiting for their priority registration and examination (TRIAGE), patients wait in the waiting room, maintaining a safe distance, in patient waiting areas.

After each patient is examined in a separate room, you need to prepare accordingly for the next patient, which takes time.

“It can also be difficult to imagine how long it actually takes to care for a patient, how long does it take to test a young child, venous blood, for COVID-19 to assess TRIAGE’s condition – after all, young children and even older ones. some are not happy to measure blood oxygen saturation and blood pressure, and the response to a blood test also does not come before 1.5 hours, as it takes a long time to perform this test in the laboratory.

It is understandable that waiting a long time is not pleasant, but if the patient is given a green color, help in case of a large influx of patients can certainly take time. We regret the situation, but we also ask for the patience and understanding of our parents, ”wrote J. Normantienė.

Information on how help is provided at the Santara clinics can be found here.