By Pepper Parr
January 19th, 2024
BURLINGTON, ON
This will be a quieter news day.
Life got in the way.
The first of the two cataract surgeries I was to undergo took place this morning.
Up at 5:30- to be at the Same Day Surgery Centre; St. Joseph Community Health Centre in Stoney Creek f0r 7:30.
The intake was incredibly smooth.
They wanted all kinds of information – the file needed to be updated and the needed to know what I was on in the way of medications and what the dosages were.
I don’t know who males of the names for these drugs – I think they spend too much time on Wordle. I know them by their size and colour.
But that got worked out.
My son drove me out and because I thought it would be hours before anything happened I suggested he go home and I would give him a call when I was ready.
This piece is about the quality of the service and the way I was taken from station to station. Most people who read the Gazette know how I feel about Joseph Brant Hospital – I will leave it at that.
No worse for the surgery – better than the picture on my passport
Someone calls my name out after a 15 minute wait and within half an hour four different people were asking questions clarifying information.
Half an hour after that there I was flat on my back staring into the face of Dr. Ann Beattie, my ophthalmologist. She looked different behind that mask.
A squirt of something to freeze the area around my right eye and in she went to cut open a space above my eye and insert a new lens that actually has a serial number. Less than half an hour and I was out of the operating room and twenty minutes after that they were ready to let me go.
They called my son and he came to pick me up.
The scope of the medical health we have in this country is astounding. Why the Americans can’t make something like this happen in their country is beyond me.
We grouch,, bitch and complain – pause for a bit and figure out what we would all do if we didn’t have the public health system we have now,
Yes, we have a government that would like to privatize much of what we have.
I don’t there is enough public support for the Ford government to pull that off.
The biggest impression I got was the tone and the attitude of the staff. They were more than pleasant, they were polite and they knew how to slow you down and ask if you’d like a few minutes.
There was never any sense if being rushed.
I had to go back in the mid afternoon to have someone check the eye and make sure there was no swelling. They did a pressure check on the eyeball and said I could go home and report to Dr. Beattie’s clinic next week for a full post op checkup.
Dr. Beattie has an office in Hamilton. If cataract surgery is in your life – remember her name. She hails from Picton and is a Habs fan. You won’t get a better deal than that.
If you want to know just how good a deal I got – we had to get a parking ticket from the machine but we never had to actually pay for parking. Not a dime.
Let me know when you get a deal like that at Jo Brant.
With your improved eyesight Pepper you’ll be able to keep an even closer watch on the antics and hijinks at Burlington City Hall! Take care, and best wishes for a speedy recovery!
As for private health care, it, like most of Doug Ford’s recent silly policy pronouncements, will likely be reversed in a couple of weeks. The only consistent thing about the provincial government is their inherent inconsistency.
Three or more comments,
1 Pepper, glad to see it went well for you.
2 I had two cataract surgeries at Jo B and everything went smoothly and quickly.
3 Residents of Burlington will have payed their $60 million tax levy share of Joe B. And have the privelege of having to pay to park.