Mother on 12-hour ER wait with sick newborn: ‘How’s there only 1 doctor?’

globalnews.ca:

A New Brunswick mother is speaking out after she recently had to wait more than 12 hours to have her sick baby seen by a doctor at the Moncton Hospital.On Friday, Emily Boros-Rausch went to the hospital with her eight-week-old baby, Laszlo. The infant had a fever, was vomiting, and had diarrhea.“We were told many times by our family doctor, even when he was born at the hospital that if a newborn has the slightest fever, take them right to the emergency because it could be a sign of something bad,” she said.

“So we rushed right there.”They arrived around 8 p.m. There was an hour-and-a-half wait to be triaged, and it was another 12 hours before Boros-Rausch would see a doctor.“When we finally saw a doctor after 12 hours, he was nothing but caring and helpful and trying to get down to the bottom of what was going on,” she said.

“But there’s just not enough doctors, which is making the wait time dangerously long.”She said nobody else in the emergency room, which was nearly full, was seen that night because there was only one doctor working, who was tied up in the trauma department.“There were definitely times where I was in tears because I was so worried and frustrated,” she said. “It got me thinking, are we safe here with little children? … How’s there only one doctor in emergency all night?”Several people ended up leaving without receiving care, said Boros-Rausch.“It was really upsetting.

I was really heartbroken by the people that I met and talked to, and heard about how long they were waiting, and seeing people literally crying in pain,” she said. “It was just a heartbreaking experience.