As a nurse with over 25 years of service at St Vincent Hospital, I’m saddened and outraged that our administrators have chosen to begin boarding patients in the hallways of our in-patient units. This is an incredibly irresponsible and unsafe initiative. This deprives patients of their dignity, privacy and robs them of their right to safe and appropriate care.
Our patients should know that we have battled against this in our emergency department, where it’s equally egregious and hazardous to your welfare. Our hospital has a designated overflow unit in the facility, with a total of 32 beds. This was opened at the insistence of the nurses to deal with the issue of the emergency department’s overcrowding. The hospital is simply choosing to allow those beds to remain unstaffed, while patients languish in our emergency department. Now they plan to move this horror to the hallways of our in-patient areas.
We must all stand together to stop this insanity. Patients cannot receive the care they deserve and need in a hallway in any area of the hospital. This is a recipe for disaster.
urge all interested parties to let the hospital know how you feel.
MARIE E. RITACCO R.N.
Auburn
