Porter Regional Hospital

Reviews 3

ME

Melanie Mulder

ABSOLUTLY go somewhere else if you are in an emergency situation, the longer drive time will not matter as you will actually be seen by competent staff faster then you will here. We brought my father, who lives in KY, in at 7pm with stroke symptoms and they literally were debating if he was a stroke case in front of us as he repeated the same questions over and over because he had no memory of anything and his BP was measuring 196/140! Then they brought him into the ER to do a CAT scan, put an IV in him and there we sat for two hours waiting for the obviously incompetent ER doctor who should have her license revoked, to finally show her face. This was after the nurse went looking for her multiple times. There was zero sense of urgency in these people, except for the nurse, and she cant do anything without the doctor. We are talking about life and death here and these people did not give a you know what. It took three viles of some medication and an oral med just to get his BP down enough to be considered ok. They claimed nothing showed up on the CAT scan and diagnosed him with some weird amnesia that had nothing to do with his BP that was through the roof, it was just a coincidence, right. They then told him that their elusive neurologist would be by that evening, wrong again. Of course they wanted to admit him to do more testing the next day. He didnt even get a room until the following evening after he had gotten an MRI and a TEE. He also started complaining about have a blind spot in his left eye but literally no one cared, they said they dont have an opthamologist and that he needed to follow up with his eye doctor when he was released. What kind of hospital doesnt have some kind of eye doctor? Or takes this seriously since he potentially had a stroke and it effected his sight? As it happens I had an eye doctor appt the next day and asked mine if they have anyone that goes to Porter hospital on call and he said yes, so they lied. So the MRI showed three new spots on his brain that no one wanted to call strokes, they were still waiting on the neurologist you know, who once again didnt show up. The following day he had an EEG which was normal and they found out that he has a defective heart valve from the TEE. Still waiting on the neurologist who finally decided to show his face the next day, three days after he was admitted and guess what, he didnt want to call them strokes either and diagnosed him with the same amnesia that they diagnosed him with in the ER and that everything else, the spots on his brain, the eye issue, the heart valve, the high BP, was all a separate issue and coincidental. Three days for this man to say absolutely nothing new and didnt know what to call the spots, youre the neuro thats you job! Well my father is back home and has gone to several doctors for second options and everyone is in agreement that it was a mini stroke and he has a clot in his eye and the tissue is dead so its permanent. If you value your life or your families lives, stay as far away from this place as possible. Thank GOD he is doing better and that it wasnt any worse because I believe they wouldve let him die. I will always think about how I should just taken him to merrillville or Crown Point to anywhere else instead of Porter just because it was closer. All of these people need to be fired.

KE

Kevin Rosko

Id say the timing to get me into a room was excellent. Considering the waiting room had one person with a child with a cut in his head. However thats where the goodness ended. After literally telling the nurses all my tests I was awaiting results on the concern kinda drifted out the window. Or an hour after being in my room "Things got really busy 10 minutes after you arrived". I get it. My BP was high, I have an auto immune marker that may be active (tests pending) and the bulge in my stomach and back pain was all speculatory in their eyes without testing. Testing I was told they wouldnt do. "We have you down for hypertension the nurse told me nearly 2 hours later. She took my BP in the room but it failed to register. Tried a bigger cuff only to get the same non result. 98/63? Another nurse enters and says Ill get my stethoscope. Never returns. Either of them. I did mention to the one nurse I had a tooth issue that may be quite infected as a root canal tooth broke off and there was a huge bubble. This nurse went on to tell me a crown is needed afterwards on root canals. She was being a dentist. That is until I asked her to look at it and see if it was abscessed or just infected. Many of my issues may have been due to this infection Ive had about 3 weeks. SSDI says once a month we take care of things and dentists get paid up front after weeks of waiting to get in. But the nurse responded "well Im not a dentist". Wow! Thanks. Ill end by saying Ive lost faith in ERs totally. I was here with my grandson and finally 2 1/2 hours later left on my own. Seen no dr only 2 nurses who made points on why I was t being seen right away. Yet 10 minutes or so would have been enough to know what we should do. Infection or no infection? Antibiotics perhaps? Well heres a tip. Be brief telling them whats up. They dont need a list because it confuses them. Dont make them think only react. Its an ER. Its what they do. But Ill tell you this. I dont care if my BP is 159/111 ( sound familiar nurses) I will NEVER go to this ER again if Im conscious. Id rather have a heart attack or stroke. Then they can do what they do best. React. Listen? Incapable....research your issue and treat accordingly. Save the insurance company money and save what time you have on this earth for outside an ER that treats you like an unwanted guest unless your dying. I love the hospital. Uncle was there with leukemia a few years back. Great facility. But first impression as a patient. Grade F.

JE

Jeff Weber

If first impressions mean anything at a new place, this hospital was awful from the onset and I would definitely NOT recommend it. We visited this hospitals Emergency Room on a Saturday night, where I noted that only one other person was waiting in the lobby ahead of us. Our first interaction with an Emergency Room registration staff member took way too long during an "emergency" situation - the staff member literally finished reading the article in whatever magazine that she was reading before acknowledging us, and further insulted our situation by answering two phone calls and getting off of her chair to buzz someone into a restricted area during her information gathering process. Despite only one person waiting ahead of us, it took nearly 45 minutes before we were seen by a nurse, and nearly 90 minutes before the doctor briefly came in to let us know that he was ordering tests and blood work. After waiting at least another hour for the results, we were forced to wait again while more tests were ordered and reviewed. The staff-to-patient ratio during our visit had to have been at least 7-to-1, so I cannot understand what these extended wait times could have been attributed to. After nearly 7 (SEVEN) hours of waiting, it turned out that our situation was a very serious one that resulted in a need to be admitted upstairs. I felt that this amount of time was completely unacceptable for assessment, particularly in light of the fact that we went to the EMERGENCY Room for care. To top it all off, on our way upstairs I looked over at the very un-busy staff and see a nurse sleeping at her station. This only further infuriated me, considering the extended time we spent waiting all night. With regards to the Emergency Room, I would again definitely NOT recommend this location for walk-in care. Our experience showed that the staff had very little interest in helping us, instead preferring to gossip, read, and/or sleep their shifts away. We experienced absolutely unprofessional service and very abhorrent care, and ultimately left very disappointed.