University of Chicago Medicine

Reviews 3

LA

Lana Berns

So far my sons experience has been a nightmare. 1. Surgery started 1 1/2 later than scheduled. Kept hearing the room wasnt ready. He almost passed out from being dehyrated so long. Thank goodness the nurse caught it right away and opened up his IV. Whoever scheduled his surgery did a poor job. 2. 8-hour surgery lasted late into night, so when our beeper finally went off, it was to send 3 families down to wait on 6th floor for another 2 hours since the staff member was going home for the night. Not enough seats were available. Also note there are no TVs for families except one TV in a tiny room on Floor 9 (ICU) and Floor 10. Most waiting is done on Floor 7. 3. NO PAIN PUMP was waiting for him in recovery. The nurse had to page someone at 3 a.m. in order to get one, and then it took another 2 hours to locate one. Seriously?? Finally a resident ordered some oral meds which just werent powerful enough to stay on top of the pain. To top it off, there was no room for him and 2 other surgical patients to go to for the night. They spent it in recovery, and as I am typing this late Thursday morning, he still is not in a room. 4. Breakfast of yogurt was ordered, but again the nurse had to make 3 complaining phone calls to get it!! This is an issue for one who has not eaten anything for 36 hours. 5. Kudos to his doctor who did everything as promised staying late into the night to talk to the family. I cannot imagine he will be very happy when he makes rounds after his office hours today. 6. The nurses truly did try to accommodate their patient and his family to the best of their abilities, but when there arent enough pain pumps to take care of patients, arent enough rooms to house patients, and food service cant deliver some simple yogurt a patient in a timely manner, something is seriously wrong. 7. Apparently my daughter-in-law keeps getting food vouchers and parking passes to appease her in lieu of these serious administration problems. She spent the night in a chair by her husbands side rather than in his room with slightly better sleeping accommodations. Instead of being able to go to her job, she is too tired to drive in order to get there. Another day of lost work through no fault of her own. Yet, I am sure the insurance company will be billed for a room that was not available until the next day. 8. My own father had surgery years ago at this facility with none of these issues. How can things get so bad in such a brand new state-of-the-art building unless it is poorly administered? Sadly, I cannot even give this hospital a one-star review. Hopefully administration will be able to keep these fine doctors and nurses in spite of their dismal leadership.

KI

Kim Calace

FIVE stars for the doctors, ONE star for the social workers. Doctors are phenomenal!! What a bunch of incompetent people in social services. Debra, Julie and Mark provided no help for what we needed. Debra seemed lazy and rude, Julie didnt bother to follow up with me about transportation options for my aunts 10 radiation treatments. My aunt had to pay for transportation out of her pocket. I informed Julie from where my aunt lives we pay $222 round trip each day and this would be for 10 days!!!. We finally received the radiation dates for treatment seven days later and Julie never got back to us. When she did, she said there was nothing out there. SHE LIED. I took it upon myself to call the American Cancer Society and they would help with transportation but it would be 10 days before they would get passes to us. The sessions would be over by then. She didnt call ACS. My aunt doesnt qualify for any help because she OWNS a house and has some money in the bank. Maybe if she was poor and destitute they would have been a little more diligent in finding us some kind of help to pay. Debra didnt want to bother getting my aunt into a nursing home that I thought would be great. She also didnt tell me about the nursing home when she gave me a list of places to check. I found the place as I was driving by to go to one of the sub-standard places. She called me on Friday and gave me a list of places....I chose five. She said she wouldnt hear back over the weekend. Monday she calls me at 4:45pm and tells me my aunt was accepted at 3 places and wanted to know which one I wanted her to go to. My aunt was being discharged on Tuesday. REALLY??? WTF IS WRONG WITH THIS? I had to chose without seeing the places? Debra said "I thought you went to check the nursing homes." Why would I go and check homes that I dont know if my aunt will be accepted to? Thats scraping the bottom of the barrel with her. Theres more to the story, but I cant write a book here. Mark returned my call and said nothing is out there for transportation....he was wrong also. AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY WILL HELP!!! Get your crap together in social services. People rely on you for help. Dont tell me to put my aunt on medicaid for everything. My aunt has insurance also, shes not there on a freebie like other patients. She pays for insurance and transportation there. She pays for transportation because shes in a wheel chair, so I cant just put her in my car and bring her. She worked hard all her life to have something, treat us with some respect we worked for this. We arent asking you to give us something for free!!!

RI

Richard Foulkes

It goes without saying that if you are reading one of these to make a decision about your healthcare I would hope you consider that individual experience should not cloud your view of such a complex question. The U of C is in the top 5 research institutions in the world. It really has no peer here in Chicago. Perhaps the Mayo clinic in Rochester would be the next closest peer. They serve because of there location a broad spectrum of patients from every economic tier and they are a referral center for cases that simply need the level of academic prowess that is found there. The newest and most advanced surgical hospital has just been completed. The hospital is adjusting to the logistics of a few floors still being housed a block away in the former building. The new Childrens hospital is a marvel and is staffed by top pediatric specialist to treat the most exotic and frightening childhood illnesss. The Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine or DCAM was designed for outpatient convenience with all labs, minor surgery and diagnostic centers and oncology chemo infusion rooms in one building. Parking costs are kept to a minimum and there is no charge for valet parking. It is a teaching institution that draws the top residents from the top medical schools around the US. The U of C virtually never needs to draw from foreign schools. Many of the residents are MD/PHDs or are striving for academic medicine and this is evident in all of your interactions there. I am a physician and I underwent surgery for a pancreatic tumor there and have had extensive experience as an out patient. Several very close friends and patients underscore my contention that this is the best institution in our area. There simply is no procedure being done to pad the billing of a doctor. They are on salary and are there to advance their fields. Tumor boards and grand rounds are not perfunctory sign ins but vigorous mining of the state of the art. I am very lucking to have had this great institution to discover a long overlooked problem by several other Chicago institutions. My diagnosis was made by a Radiologist who literally wrote the book on imaging of pancreatic tumors and was able to demonstrate the tumor had been there for over 5 years missed on scans at other institutions. This is the bottom line to me. You need to feel you have been given your best shot at a state of the art institution that is dedicated to advancement of knowledge not personal wealth. The University of Chicago is our Midwest answer to that challenge.