I'm saddened that Mary is not well. Sounds like good medical
care. Best wishes, that she's all better, soon.

In the coincidence department. A friend of mine, Dr. Mayo
works in a hospital in Rochester, NY. Though, not St. Mary's
Hospital.

--
Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..


"Don Foreman" wrote in
message ...
St. Mary's hospital in Rochester, MN is very, very
impressive. We
were there from Monday evening until Friday midday. Not a
planned
event, **** happens. We were in Roch Monday evening for an
overnight
visit to make a Tue AM appointment easy, planned to return
Tue and be
home before sundown or even rush hour.

Had a very nice dinner in downtown Rochester Monday evening,
returned
to motel. An early bedtime pit stop for Mary with a bit
of
assistance from me showed unequivocal evidence of an
internal bleed.
Damn, that wasn't on the agenda! We called a number at
Mayo we
had, both knowing that the next stop would be the ER at St.
Mary's.
And so it was.

I'd no more than stopped the car at the ER entrance, wind
chill about
-25 that night, when a woman came out the door with a
wheelchair and
transferred Mary from car to wheelchair like she'd done it
before more
than once. By the time I'd parked and returned, not more
than 10
minutes in the arctic chill, Mary was thru triage and in
a room
being hooked up with half a dozen people busy around her.
BP was so
low they couldn't find a vein to start a transfusion. Mar
was weak,
but completely lucid. Our E.R. banter seems to engage the
E.R.
teams. We know a bit about serious but we respect and
trust the
professionals who are doing their best and we understand
that bad
**** happens to good people some days. Gloom will not
deflect the
grim reaper, gritty cheerful attitude sometimes does for a
while.
Fast forward thru ER, ICU and meds floor to discharge
midday today.
Very, very impressive.

Mayo is a non-profit or not-for-profit institution. I don't
know what
the difference is between those terms, but there is a
marked
difference between whatever those are and for-profit
operations like
Allina. We think Allina delivers pretty good care, but
definitely
not to the Mayo level of compassion and commitment to
quality of life.
The difference is in how the people are allowed to be
motivated. Mayo
is non-union, non-profit, not government subsidized other
than by
medicare. Their diverse staff is fairly compensated and
recognized
for making a difference. They walk the extra mile every day
because
that's what they want to do, and the org allows, encourages,
rewards
and even expects and requires that behavior and attitude.
The
current class in the Mayo medical school has 42 students.
One of
Mary's doctors was Kelsy, a 4th year resident as a brand-new
MD. They
connected like magnets. Kelsy aspires to be an ER doc at
Regions in
St. Paul or Hennepin County in Mnpls. Those are both very
gritty
venues. She'll be quietly brilliant wherever she goes.
She's
engaged, has a very nice ring. Well duh, her fiance is
connected to
J. B. Hudson somehow some way. Kelsy doesn't come from
money, just
from motivation. Mayo requires docs to wear suits. She
had to
borrow a suit from a friend. On her next tour she'll be
able to wear
scrubs. She can still wear her nice ring, of course.

I think they liked our attitude too.

One of the things they did at St. Mary's in Rochester was to
wrap
Mary's calves, ankles and feet with Ace bandages to combat
edema as
Mary's body aspires to become a watermelon from the
transfusions and
IV's to keep her BP up to functionally alive and able to
walk tens of
feet with a walker appliance. I watched carefully as Roxy
the
compassionate nurse did that. We learned in conversation
that Roxy
has been up and down a couple of rockpiles we know a little
about, so
we were sorta sympatico.

The Ace bandages came kinda undone this evening at the
rehab facility
after travel, several transfers and a couple of bathroom
stops, so I
redid them. Later a nurse came in to have a look at Mary.
She noted
the wrappings, asked Mary if she might like them off for the
night,
noting that this is usual practice. Mary said OK, then
mentioned
that the wraps were done by her hubby. The nurse did a
doubletake,
said "really?". Wull, ya. She looked at me with almost
disbelief
and said, "you did it perfectly!"

Aw shucks, grin grin.

That felt good. I did try to observe, learn and get it
right.

On Tue, 15 Feb 2011 08:14:08 -0500, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

I'm saddened that Mary is not well. Sounds like good medical
care. Best wishes, that she's all better, soon.

In the coincidence department. A friend of mine, Dr. Mayo
works in a hospital in Rochester, NY. Though, not St. Mary's
Hospital.

Further coincidence: the SIL of a friend of mine is very sick in
Strong Memorial hospital in Rochester NY with a very rare disease.
Staff at that hospital knows about as much as anyone about this
particular disease, LaMierre's syndrome. Something like 160 cases in
100 years up until recently.