For those of you who prefer a video, you can check out my rant on Odysee. For everyone else…please, read on…

OMG, you guys. Monday morning, Squatch came out to the living room after sleeping in, and he looked like shit. Apparently he woke up in the middle of the night with crazy heartburn and a sharp pressure and pain in his upper abdomen/chest, right where the bottom ribs meet the sternum. I immediately had a flashback to August 2010, and said “I think it’s your gallbladder.”

So, he drank some water and sat up for a bit; not laying down was relieving the pressure he had felt. Half an hour later, he called his primary care doctor to see if he could get in for an emergency appointment. The triage nurse he spoke to decided to send him to the Urgent Care they are affiliated with that is closer than the doctor (it’s 45 minutes away, near the in-laws, where we had lived before moving into The Little Red House). So, Little Man threw some books and toys into his backpack, I grabbed a change of clothes and jammies for him, and we went off with full water bottles to Urgent Care.

Now…halfway there, I looked over to Squatch “Do you have my keys in your pocket?” I asked, because he walked out after Little Man and I did. “Uhh…No, I thought you shut and locked the door. I went to check the postbox, then came to the car.” Oopsies. Well, we continued to Urgent Care, and he texted me shortly after that he was registered and waiting to go in for testing. Little Man and I turned the car around and came home, to find that the door was indeed unlocked, but at least it was shut. I did a quick clean-up & organization of the kitchen, and we were on our way back to meet Daddy (with a stop for Nuggets & Fries for Little Man, as it was almost lunchtime by now).

We sat in the parking lot as it snowed around us for about half an hour. The Urgent Care only had an EKG, no ultrasound or XRay, o the Physician Assistant on call ruled out gallbladder issues and went right to heart (Umm…Really?!). They determined his EKG was abnormal and said they were going to arrange for an ambulance to transport him to the ER around the corner. He said “No. My wife is in the parking lot. She can drive me there.” A bit of back and forth and a signed waiver later, he hopped in the car and I drove the 2 minutes to the Emergency Room. He got out and went inside, and I found a parking spot and called MIL to come pick up Little Man because I knew we would be there for a while. MIL & FIL arrived about 40 minutes later, we did the Little Man exchange, and I headed inside.

Now, as a pregnant lady, I’ve always got my water bottle with me, so I walked in, grabbed a mask, and held onto it as I sipped my water and talked to the registration people. (No mask if you’re eating or drinking!!!). The straw stayed in my mouth as I walked back to find Squatch’s room, where I found him getting an ultrasound to see if there were gallstones or any other issues found. “The tables have turned,” I said, “But instead of a baby, it looks like you’re going to have a dinosaur!” The tech laughed, I laughed, Squatch laughed and then cussed me out because it hurt. I popped the mask on for a few minutes as the tech finished the ultrasound, and pulled it back off as soon as she walked out the door. The mask shenanigans are just that – shenanigans.

Squatch filled me in – his EKG at hospital was normal, so anything heart related was immediately dismissed. The doctor came in shortly after, ruling out the gallbladder, and we decided to have a CAT scan done to rule out any other problems. A bit after the CAT scan, the doctor came back and said they were diagnosing Squatch with a hiatal hernia. There’s not a lot we can do for it, but he will be resting and taking it easy the next few weeks until he can see his primary care physician for a follow-up. He will NOT be taking the Prilosec the ER doctor prescribed him. We’re going to focus on his clean diet instead, and will keep Little Man from jumping on him when they wrestle.

Now…I’m annoyed with the triage nurse at his doctor’s office. Why she would tell him to go to Urgent Care, that doesn’t have the equipment needed for a gallbladder diagnosis, I will never know. Yes, it’s in his doctor’s network, but the hospital they sent him to for the ER is not. We could have just gone around the corner to Mayo, instead of driving the 15 minutes into town only to have to take him somewhere else. And, I could have hung out at home with Little Man instead of being in the car with him for several hours (I did get stuck in the backseat due to the child locks being on. I’m glad I’m not a super big belly pregnant lady, or else it would have been super awkward to climb to the front to get out and then open the back door to turn off the child lock.).

Now, after chatting with a few other people who live in different parts of the country, it is not uncommon for Urgent Care clinics to be missing critical equipment. One friend paid his copay for a clearly broken toe and went in, got the XRay, only to be told there was no radiologist there to review the scan, so he would have to go home and wait for the call or else take the scan to the ER (where they would probably just xray him again). Or they are missing the staff that is needed for your particular problem, but still take you in but then have to send you to the ER. And these are not just COVID issues…some of the problems I learned about are dating back years, in suburban AND rural locations, large and small medical groups. So, what the hell, Urgent Care? What use is there in going to Urgent Care if they tend to just ship you over to the ER? From now on, to the Emergency Room we shall go.