2-year old Malyia was rushed to the Methodist Hospital, five miles from their Sacramento, ER Monday morning after her parents had noticed that her fever kept rising and a mysterious bruise was spreading over her face. After five hours of waiting in the ER, Malyia was taken to a room. Malyia's blood tests showed that her liver was failing. Malyia was then transferred to pediatric intensive care unit and diagnosed with Strep A infection, "a flesh eating bacteria".
As Malyia's condition worsened she was transferred once again to Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford University. Once she arrived she was immediately put on life support. After three weeks of being hospitalized at Stanford, the doctors had to amputate Malyia's her left hand, some fingers on her right hand, and both of her legs under the knee.
Malyia's parents thought that the infection of resulted from an ear piercing that had gotten infected.
The Government Accountability Office, 2009, reported that the average wait time in the ER has been rising. The reason being is that the ERs do not have enough beds for every patient that needs assistance. ERs suggest you check the average wait time online and to call your doctor and describe your conditions before coming in. If your condition continue to worsen call your doctor and he/ she will advice you of what to do.
Do you guys think our Emergency Rooms need to be more efficient? What do you guys think about Malyia's story?
3 comments:
I think Malyia's story illustrates our need for increased efficiency in emergency rooms. Malyia's sitaution doesn't deviate far from the norm; according to the American College of Emergency Physicians, the average ER patient in America waits for more than four hours to see a physician. While increasing efficiency is easier said than done and would take an incredible amount of money/time, the effort is worth it. You can't put a price tag on the number of lives that could be potentially saved. At least, that's my point of view.
I think that there are two factors here: the fact that Malyia had her ears at a young age and the efficiency (or lack thereof) of our emergency rooms.
Young children haven't really built up their immune systems yet, so this maybe could serve as an example of why children shouldn't have their ears pierced at a young age. Maybe her parents missed something when they were cleaning their daughter's ears (as you're supposed to after your ears are pierced). This could also be one of those cases that can happen, but usually doesn't.
Either way, I think the more important issue is the workings of an emergency room. It doesn't really seem so "emergent" anymore if there's a four or five hour wait. From what I can tell from other articles I've read on this issue, it's simply an issue of overflow of patients and understaffed and undersupplied hospitals. The doctors and nurses are trying their best, but it's crazy with everyone wanting to be first. Also, emergency rooms are required to see every patient, so many people without insurance are also going to the emergency rooms. I totally agree with Shorhon that a price tag can't be put on life, so this needs to be addressed in Congress. However, with the health reform being so hotly contested by the current Congress, I don't see this being addressed anytime soon.
Okay, well if I'm reading this right, my question is, why would you give a baby an ear piercing? I mean usually people pierce their ears when they're, I don't know, around ages 11-17, or somewhere in that ballpark. With Malyia only being two years old, she couldn't possibly have talked to her parents about her illness, or feeling weird simply because she doesn't have the capability to express herself through either simple words like "mom" or "dad" or through crying. Unfortunately, I think it was just rash judgment from the parents.
On the other hand, yes, I agree the Emergency Room is failing us. Having been in one before, although my injury wasn't serious, I had to wait at least four hours just to get treated. If i had a more dire or fatal illness, it could have gotten fatally worse, depending on the extremity of the sickness. The ER definitely needs to do something about its long waits. They are unnecessary, and the word "emergency" in its name implies that someone or something is in dire need of medical attention due to unforeseen circumstances. Anything can happen in a five hour wait, and if we had more rooms, beds, doctors, and funding towards the ER, we could more efficiently save lives and could more effectively treat people's injuries.
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