I had never been to the hospital as much as I could remember until early last year while I was in school. How it all played out is still a surprise to me because it was one of the worst experiences I've had and I definitely do not want such to repeat itself. Hospitals in Nigeria needs a lot of work on them, from the practitioners to the facilities used in hospitals. Everything should be revisited for better services.
Well, that may never happen but there's no wrong in wishing I guess
My first experience with hospital happened to be a very painful and annoying one that I can not forget in a long time. What happened? Here is my story!
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I was alone in my room at night feeling some slight pain in my abdomen, it was normal for me because I felt it was caused by what I ate. So I just continued doing what I was busy with until a friend of mine visited. We began to gist and I was acting like I wasn't feeling any pain since it wasn't so serious. But the pain started to become unbearable, my friend got worried but I tried to let her worry less since I've been through such before.
Well, I still can't pick the details on how I got to a hospital about 30 mins away from my place. But I was told my friend called another friend and that friend called another with a vehicle and I got there still trying to act like I could bear it much longer than I had.
Its Appendix, you will need to go for the surgery room!
That was what the doctor we met said without any tests done or even to check my vitals if I'm fit to go into the surgery room.
I found myself in a very ugly looking theater, some nurses were trying to put some cannulas and stuffs in my veins. I knew things were not going right but I was too weak and in pains to say anything. The hospital lights went off and some guys shouted that there was no fuel in the power supplier anymore 😂 you can imagine how wicked the hospital were to their patients.
That was how I got out of the surgery room and left when the doctor got into his car to go buy fuel. My mum and uncle even called to stop us from going ahead with the surgery. My friends took me to a general hospital from there, it was even farther than where we first went.
Getting there, we were sent to the accident and emergency ward. The smell and screams that welcomed us could measure to the pain I was feeling at that time. My friends joined in the screaming so they could attend to me quickly but what we didn't realize until the next day was that they won't give us attention unless we know someone who knows someone in the hospital.
My friends were able to force their way to getting a bed for me but no treatment or whatever was given to me until the next day when my mum came around. You don't want to imagine the pain I went through that night, I got to know how long nights are when we sleep through it because I couldn't fall asleep in the pain, it kept getting worse.
The next day, a nurse came to my bed and asked what my issue is and my friends tried to explain to her because I couldn't speak well at that time, I was too weak to. The nurse left us again for many hours after asking, I still didn't get to know why she came to ask when she wasn't going to do anything about it 🤦♀️
Mum came around and as a nurse that she is, she made my friend buy some medication only her and the nurses or doctors in the hospital know and gave them to me herself in the emergency ward there. Yes, I got treatment from my mum in a hospital I went to take treatments.
We did scans and other tests, found out there was nothing like appendix but some cyst to be treated with antibiotics. I couldn't stop thinking about the risk I was taking when I went into a surgical room to remove appendix that I didn't have. Thanks to mum, I didn't lose anymore strength before I regained myself well enough to go back home with her.
That experience has been in my memory as the worst one I've had in falling sick. It also made me realized that hospitals can not be trusted so it's best to led a healthy life and pray not to fall too sick. Thinking back now, I feel so grateful to my mum and my friends who were with me all through that time, things would have gone out of hand if not for them.
