From Snake Scares to ER Epiphanies: A Journey Through Fear and Frustration

I hate snakes! As my friends and family will attest, this hatred is pure and unwavering. When I say I hate snakes, I’m including the animals, toy snakes, images in books, radio talks, TV shows, and all internet clips featuring them. In my humble opinion, no girl has ever looked hot with one wrapped around her shoulders. They are vile creatures; a piece of string that can move insanely fast and can kill me despite having no legs or arms. To me, they are a science fiction monster that became real. Guess what? I had one slither over my shoes while hiking yesterday, and it scared the hell out of me. Yesterday was not a good day!

To answer your question, I have no idea what type of snake it was. According to my PTSD, it was roughly 12 inches long and lighter in color with black spots. I assume it wasn’t a rattler since I fell right next to it and didn’t get bitten. Maybe it was scared to death to see my oversized 6-foot-5-inch frame fall. Since I was bleeding and didn’t want to risk a reaction to a possible bite while watching NCIS reruns on my couch, I made the adult decision to go to the emergency room.

I fell hard, which, considering my size, naturally caused pain. However, I felt like I had more pain than the fall would justify—me, of course, being a leading expert on falling. Out of an abundance of caution, combined with my replaced joints and blood thinners, the ER doc ordered a CT scan for my head and had my right wrist, pelvis, and right hip x-rayed. Long story short, the CT scan showed I had a brain, and the x-rays didn’t show anything broken. Although I’m still hurting today, it looks like I walked away from my snake encounter with a sprained wrist, some decent hip bruising, snake PTSD, a giant load in my drawers, but no snake bite. Winner winner chicken dinner.

While in the ER, I had a couple of epiphany-type thoughts that I wanted to share with you. The first is probably going to be controversial—it’s about pain management, or the lack thereof. The second has to do with the power dynamic between a hospital and its patients. I shouldn’t have to recite my name and birthday more than a few times at most, let alone as many times as I had to tell the story of why I was in the ER in the first place. We get it, hospital; you want to bill for every second I was there.

Let’s begin with some possible controversy: pain management. When asked by the physician assistant (PA) shortly after arriving in the ER, I reported my pain level was at a 6 or 7. Despite what the public or even some of you might think, I did not want nor expect any help with my pain. My goal for going to the ER was to ensure that I was not bitten and to make sure nothing was broken. Assuming nothing was broken and the snake hadn’t bitten me, the pain from my fall would be easy to handle. A little rest, a comfort hug from my TV, and my regular dose of Oxy from all my other health problems, and I would be back on the trails, scared of seeing another snake in no time. Regardless, the PA offered a couple of Tylenol, which I agreed to take, not for the pain, but because this was a policy change from the last time I was in the ER at St. Luke’s. I was curious to see how they would handle my pain.

Time to cause some trouble. I’m now regretting my decision to take the Tylenol. During a couple of interactions with different nurses, I mentioned that as my adrenaline was calming down, my pain levels were rising. Everyone I dealt with yesterday was very kind and seemed empathetic, but they didn’t seem to care. No one even acknowledged my statement about my pain levels rising. If I had to do it again, I would have laughed at the offer and told them to keep their Tylenol. In addition, I would have demanded not to be charged for it and told them that if they didn’t want to treat my pain, that’s fine—lawyers exist for a reason. But don’t pretend to offer pain management when we all know your offer is nothing more than a political or moral plan to reduce the number of opioids the hospital prescribes, regardless of the pain your patients are in.

The reason for this change of heart is because I’m now concerned some idiot hospital administrator or politician will look at my case as a pain management success story and use it as a reason to believe all pain can be treated with Tylenol. I didn’t go to the ER for pain nor was I seeking treatment for pain. They would be falsely using my story to deny real pain relief to car wreck victims, people with broken arms, rheumatoid arthritis patients who underwent a total joint replacement surgery, or a cancer patient who underwent a complex procedure to remove a tumor. How do I know this? Because these are real-world examples, and some hospital administrators are proud and love to brag about of the fact they will only prescribe Tylenol.

For the record, I would love to be able to use Tylenol or Advil to treat my chronic pain. I tried using them for several years with some success, but in the end, the disease and damage proved to be too much for this treatment option. I’m not against using Tylenol or Advil at all, even as a pain management option for surgery recovery. My point is pain is not a one-size-fits-all health issue as these administrators and politicians like to believe and put into practice. Pain management treatment plans must be based on the individual (the human being in pain), not some politician’s whim or some nonprofit that does not care about patients at all.

Ok, enough controversy for one post. Let’s switch gears. Why do we have to tell every hospital employee that makes eye contact our name and birthdate but not require the same level of ID verification from people giving us powerful meds, injections, and surgeries? The simple answer has to do with power dynamics, otherwise known as the need to make sure they bill you for everything you touch while in their facility.

A hospital as an entity would make a unique character in a dramatic fantasy world. It is the only place on earth where one goes at their most vulnerable and desperate and has complete strangers with not much more than a college degree who require you to get completely naked, hand you various pills that most of us can’t pronounce correctly, and shave your god stick and shame cave (as the comedian Jon Stewart once referred to it). They have the legal right to require you to pay for it because it falls under the umbrella of “surgery prep” and not an attempted sexual assault if the same thing happened elsewhere. Despite this, you need to know my full name and date of birth every 20 minutes so you can make sure to bill the right person. Talk about a power dynamic that needs to change.

Yesterday’s snake experience was not as dramatic as surgery prep (I know from lots and lots of experience), especially for a location where hiking is a main attraction. One is bound to have a snake encounter at some point when living in my city—that’s just statistics. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t in a vulnerable and desperate state; I’m very afraid of snakes regardless of whether they are real or a stupid toy. I also know that because of our healthcare system, I’m looking at a bill of several thousand dollars, which, as an unemployed person, I do not need right now. This adds to my vulnerability. Can’t a hospital be the one aspect of our care that goes out of its way to reduce vulnerability? Shouldn’t this be part of everyone’s standard of care? Asking who I am and what my date of birth is only helps the hospital accountants and finance people. Why do they get more attention and care than I do during my time of vulnerability?

I don’t have a good answer for the question, "How might we change any or all of this for the better?" All I do know is there is power in raising the question to whomever might be listening (I even wrote a post about the Power of a Question—please check it out HERE). We must let those willing to listen know that pain management is not about the pain level of our fellow humans; it’s about whatever program is currently hot in the pain management world. That isn’t patient-centered care; it’s a symptom of a profit-based healthcare system. The same logic applies to asking for our name and date of birth before every encounter with a hospital employee. Hospitals are exploiting a power dynamic that is already heavily skewed in their favor. This is also a symptom of a profit-based healthcare system and not patient-centered. Don’t ever quit asking, "How might we change this?"

I’ve never seen a snake on this trail!!!