Danielle DeGregorio Review of St. michael's hospital
My grandfather passed away in the ER a few weeks a...
My grandfather passed away in the ER a few weeks ago. The nurses and palliative care doctors were very attentive and compassionate. They made his passing as painless as possible and checked in on us regularly. So a huge thank you to them.
Unfortunately, we had issues with security in front of the ER. The doctors and receptionist explicitly told my whole family that we were permitted to come and go from the ER building throughout the day to get food and take walks, as we were confined to one room, waiting for my grandfather to pass away. However, whenever we would try to get back into the ER, a security guard would give us a hard time. I would been able to overlook the inconvenience of explaining the situation to them multiple times, but in my grandfather's final moments, some of us were trying to get back in, but security would not let us pass. It was awful to see members of my family crying and calling out to my dying grandfather from outside the building as he was taking his last breaths. We could not be there by his side because security didn't know we were allowed to go into the ER.
I completely understand that security has to do their jobs and they have been given instructions about whom to let in and when. But we were told multiple times by staff in the ER that we were an exception because my grandfather was on his deathbed. It was incredibly upsetting to have to clash with security all day, and especially in my grandfather's final moments. This lack of communication prevented us from being all together when he died.
I can only imagine how difficult it is to be hospital staff especially during this pandemic and I understand that that security has to deal with difficult people every day. I know it's easy for me to criticize in hindsight, but I'm writing this review in hopes that some attention will be given to this issue so that others won't experience what we did. If the policies and communication are clearer between security and medical staff, it will save some families a lot of hurt. Thank you very much for reading.
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