Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 19, 1993 TAG: 9301190110
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CAROLYN CLICK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
WOMAN'S HOSPITAL ORDEAL BLAMED ON BUREAUCRACY
A Bedford County family says bureaucratic snafus turned into a medical morass for a woman who suffered a series of strokes in the emergency room of the Bedford County Memorial Hospital on New Year's Day.First, the hospital's computerized tomography, or CT, scan broke just as doctors were trying to determine exactly what was wrong with Charlaine Wagner, who had struck her head a day earlier and was experiencing numbness in her left arm.
The machine is an advanced diagnostic tool that can, among other things, measure trauma and detect tumors in various parts of the body.
Doctors quickly determined that she should be transferred to the larger Lynchburg General Hospital for a CT scan there.
But the 54-year-old Moneta woman, whose condition was worsening, was forced to wait several hours for an ambulance.
The hospital's own Carilion ambulance crew was unavailable, and the volunteer Bedford Life Saving Crew refused to transport her from Bedford to Lynchburg, said Cindy Wagner, her daughter-in-law. Instead, the crew recommended the hospital notify a paid ambulance service.
Eventually, a private ambulance from Lynchburg did respond, picking up Charlaine Wagner about 9:10 p.m., five hours after she was admitted at 4:05 p.m.
Although family members say they do not question the quality of hospital care Charlaine Wagner received while in the Bedford emergency room, they say they are frustrated by the slowness in transferring her.
"I seriously thought about putting here in my station wagon and taking her there myself," said Paul Sleeper, a son-in-law of Charlaine Wagner's.
The head of the Bedford Life Saving Crew says the service does not have enough volunteer manpower to handle interhospital transfers and routinely turns down such calls.
"Once the patient is in the hospital, that becomes the hospital's responsibility," said Jeff Johnson, captain of the crew.
"We do some [interfacility transfers] but normally during daylight hours we do not," said Johnson. "It depends on whether we have the manpower."
According to Cindy Wagner, Charlaine Wagner's troubles began Dec. 31, while she was at work managing the Vinton Cherokee Bowl. Her chair broke, and she plunged to the floor, striking her head on a desk.
Cindy Wagner said her mother-in-law was plagued by severe headaches in the hours after her fall. On New Year's Day, she managed to go to work, but called her husband to take her to the hospital because her arm was growing numb.
Cindy Wagner said the scene at the hospital was personally devastating.
"The nurse was crying, my sister-in-law was crying. It was the most emotional thing to see my mother-in-law in that state. She was in such pain that she couldn't even move her left side at all."
Family members say they know that the Bedford crew, because it relies on volunteer assistance, has the right to make judgments about the calls it makes.
But they suggested such emergency situations deserve closer scrutiny.
"They [doctors] say she was going to go through with the whole stroke regardless," said Roxanne Sleeper, daughter of the victim and a Bedford hospital employee. "I just thought it was a sad community service to refuse her."
Emergency room nurse Beverly Terry said she has also made known her concerns about the situation.
"I was frustrated because of the urgency of the situation," she said.
Hospital Administrator John Fretz expressed surprise that the family had not contacted him to discuss the situation.
"I wish they would," he said. Also, he said, "they need to make their concerns known to the rescue crew."
But Johnson, who was also unaware of the situation, said no one had complained to him, either.
Fretz said he planned to meet with the crew's leaders to discuss the situation.
Since the incident, Roxanne Sleeper said, several volunteers have told the family they would have readily handled the call if they had known the details of the situation.
She said her mother remains in the Lynchburg hospital undergoing intensive therapy but has been moved from the intensive-care unit.