Emergency Room Lobby

I decided a couple of years ago to go to area locations in order to do one of my favorite hobbies:  People-watching.  This writing is from my hospital Emergency Room (ER) observations.  The reason why I wrote down my people-watching experiences is mainly because I was taking an Anthropology class, and I had to do it for a grade.  It wasn't supposed to be of any entertainment value, but that's the way it came out for me.

Which ER days do I want?

It would seem that the most logical time to visit the ER for entertainment, or at least to see some action, would be on Friday nights and Saturdays.  Not always so.  Thursdays and Sundays, the days I picked, are quite busy.  

Thursdays are busy because a lot of people get paid on Thursday, so drug-deal beatings, barroom stabbings, and car wrecks at the Wal-Mart intersection occur more often.  

Sunday nights are good for domestic violence, because by then the payday money is all gone, and people have had enough of being with their families through the weekend.  Also, people who hurt themselves on Friday night or Saturday do not want to spend their off-time at an ER, so they wait until Sunday afternoon to get the (by then infected) injury treated.  Another angle there is that they get to miss at least Monday's work day while they heal. 

In addition to all that, I figure heart attacks and sports injuries happen a lot on Sundays because of the weekend warriors.  Those are the baby boomers who never exercise except on Sunday, when they try to catch up on all those days of the week they skipped.  
 

Who is allowed in the ER waiting room?

In my small town, anybody can enter the emergency room and sit in the lobby without actually needing medical help.  In big city ERs, you have to pass a security guard and go through an airport style weapons detector, but none of that here, so here is where I stayed.  I did however tell the receptionist behind the desk about the study I was doing, because I did not want her to think I was a homeless person setting up house.

The "Watching" Part

Thursday

       
There is a young woman standing out front of the automatic sliding doors, and she is smoking a cigarette and talking on her cell phone 90 miles a minute.  She has on Sponge Bob flannel pajama bottoms, flip flops, and a Roll Tide Alabama hoodie.   

Inside the lobby, a television is positioned high up on the wall, and it is tuned in to Law & Order.  Appropriate programming in an ER?  Maybe not.  I guess it could have been on something even less appropriate, like for instance, Dr. G Medical Examiner.  

I get myself seated down in a corner to get the best view of the room’s happenings. 
 

Sitting with their backs to the wall is a young Hispanic couple with two little kids; they look about two and three years of age.  The smallest one looks very sick. Both the kids are quiet, and the couple speaks to each other in really low tones, as if to avoid drawing attention.  In the center of the room is seated a woman, 60-something, and wearing nice dress pants and a jacket.  She is reading a book.  Closer to the TV is a woman about thirty or so, with a boy about 13.  He has one shoe on and his other foot is wrapped up in that beige gauze that sticks to itself.  I think the mom likes Law & Order. 
  

Out of the bathroom come two teenage girls heading towards the vending machines.  Both girls are chatting to each other, and at the same time both are also texting.  One of them gets a bag of Fritos and a Dr. Pepper.  These girls are chopping up some unseen third party pretty good.  They “can’t stan' bein’ 'round her” because she is “skank” and she was “flashin’ it around” the other night at Kenesha’s.  What is “kenesha”?  All the time they carry this on they also text.  How do they multi-task like that?  They go sit against the wall hunched together so they can gossip some more.  Surely neither one of them is waiting to see an ER doctor.

The receptionist calls for Ms. Somebody to come to the desk.  The nicely-dressed reading lady goes over and they whisper some things back and forth.  Reading lady sits back down.  I hear the ambulance outside.  The really gory or otherwise bad ones on gurneys have to be wheeled into another door just to the side of the sliding door, so the lobby-dwellers do not see them.  The nurse calls for Ms. Somebody the book reader, and this time she goes through the treatment door.  She looks alright, so maybe she’s waiting for someone else who is getting treatment. 

   
The nurse comes back out in a bit and calls out a Hispanic name.  The couple with kids goes through the treatment door.  A young fellow with his hand bandaged up comes out of the treatment doors.  He calls out the sliding doors to “Sherry”, the badly-dressed chatty young cigarette-smoking girl, and she comes in to help him listen to the lady behind the desk.  Gossiping girls are still texting.  The 30-something mom is still watching TV, and her teen's head is tilted back like he’s nodding off.  

I hear the rumble of the helicopter coming onto the rooftop.  There is no trauma center here, so it must be picking up the ambulance rider that came in a while ago—a rider who should have been helicoptered directly from his traumatic incident to the big city in the first place.

In come some winners!  

This group of folks has a heavily tattooed guy with his arm completely wrapped up from hand to above the elbow.  It is in a makeshift sling.  Most of his other hand is likewise wrapped up, except for a couple of protruding fingers.  His face has some cuts on it and it looks severely sunburned.  His people include a girl with piercings on her face, two other tattoo guys, and a woman with a very gravelly voice who looks much older than she probably is.  She is extremely skinny, with a face like leather, and her hair is long and scraggly.  She is in charge of the group.  

Everybody hears her mailing address announcement, her smoker’s coughs, and everything else we didn’t want to hear.  What I did not catch is what the injured guy said had happened to himself.  I wonder if whatever he told the receptionist was the whole truth.  I have heard about illegal methamphetamine-concocting contraptions (meth labs) exploding and this looks sort of like the kind of injury one would sustain if that were to happen. 

I should not stereotype people.     

They all go sit down for about three minutes, when Ms. Cough, the injured guy, and one Tattoo go outside to smoke.  So that’s why the hurt guy left a couple of fingers sticking out of his bandage--to hold a cigarette.  I hear another ambulance coming in. 

Nurse calls for the teenage boy with the foot problem.  He hobbles and his mom walks beside him through the treatment door.  After a few minutes, the nurse calls the name of the Cough/Tatoo group, and the pierced girl goes to the sliding door to get the injured guy.  He comes in and goes through the treatment door.  Ms. Cough is behind him griping about something, and coughing quite loudly.
    
That’s all for me today--I'm gone.

    

Sunday 

Three people, a 50-ish couple and 30-ish man, are standing outside the sliding doors, and smoking cigarettes.  

Inside, I sit in a row seat in the middle of the waiting room; there are rows behind and in front of me.  I am facing the treatment doors again but closer in from the wall so I can hear the whole room better.  Not much going on, I guess because it’s too early in the afternoon.  Noisy, heavy 30-something woman with three very loud and misbehaving kids sit behind me.  None appear sick, so I deduce theirs is a routine doctor visit disguised as an emergency due to a lack of insurance (don't stereotype, Reno!).  With an extremely southern drawl, the woman issues criticisms and warnings to her out-of-control kids. 

In front of me the row of chairs are back to back, one row facing me and the other facing away from me and toward the treatment doors.  A blonde girl, about 18-20 and wearing blue jeans, is seated on her knees backward in the chair.  Her back is to me, and she is anxiously facing the treatment doors.  She sniffles softly (I guess, since I can’t hear her over the noisy people behind me) as she brings a tissue to her nose every so often.  Somebody very beloved to her must be in the treatment area.   

Seated at the side wall are a young man and woman, and he has a rag on his eye.  He takes it off and rearranges it some as he keeps his eye squinted.  Other than that, the lobby is empty, so it looks like a short visit for me.  Besides, I do not know how long I can stand the rowdy kiddie crowd behind me.  If the mom has told them once to “be quaiyt!” she has told them fifty times.  She has bribed them with vending machine treats, she has swatted them, she has threatened them, she has cajoled them, and all to no avail.  I felt so bad for the anxious girl in front of me, as I’m sure the racket was not helping her feelings.

      
The nurse comes out and calls a name.  The anxious sniffling girl backs out of her chair and starts walking to the treatment doors.  That’s when I saw the flash.  Sticking out of her right buttock is a shiny crochet needle!  

Now, I know nothing about the art of crocheting, but I do recognize the purplish stick that protrudes out against the blue denim-covered derrière.  It could be a knitting needle, but they are pointed and that would have been easy enough to pull out at home.  That’s why I deduce this to be a crochet needle, with a hooked end that is going to have to be surgically removed.  She has not been worried about another person, she has been crying from embarrassment. 

I wonder how it came to be there, in her buttock that is.  And hey, I wonder how she got here.  Because she could not have driven herself.  She would have had to sit on her side in the passenger seat, and there was no one with her in the waiting room.  I will continue to ponder that--the crochet needle incident--which made this ER trip worthwhile for me.

I have to get away from these noisy kids and their noisy mother.  I'm outta' here.       

      
About the Anthropology assignment:  I didn't get a 100% on this observation--the professor said I had too much fun with it.  She told me to remember that I was not supposed to make a comedy out of it, and that I should keep my snarky opinions to myself.  I did however end up with an overall A in the class--for the record to any interested person reading this.

       

DISCLAIMER

To any readers who think they recognize themselves, or think these descriptions remind them of themselves, or think there is an inkling of a resemblance to themselves:  Know that you are totally mistaken.  If you or any reader claims otherwise, be it known that your claims are bogus.       

  

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