Are you permitted bring a pillow to the emergency room when you expect a five hour wait?

Yup

Yeah you can bring pretty much anything that isn’t a weapon, no one’s gonna care. Sorry you get saddled with such long waits. :(

Bring an airbed next time.

Yes. Bring the pillow.

And a small but cozy blanket.

Yes. And, if you need to
lay down, if they have a bed, they may be willing to set you up in a bed in the hall. If they’re that busy they probably don’t have a bed, but if you’re desperate you can ask. Plus, you can ask for blanket if you’re cold.

Keep an inflatable neck pillow with you. You can easily keep it folded in a pocket for when you need it, and it’s just as comfortable as a regular pillow (and more convenient to use sitting up in a chair).

@Mariah I spent 12 hours in a hospital waiting room in Montreal with a finger so mangled that you could see the bone sticking out. (A friend’s wheelchair had crushed it when it went down into a water-filled pothole and tipped over, the handle landing on my finger as I also fell with it.) The nurses called me over every couple of hours to ask me about pain. I told them it was an 8 out of 10 and they just nodded, added another layer of bandage over the blood-soaked previous layer, and sent me back out without so much as an aspirin. When I finally got in to see a doctor he gave me a blast of shit for waiting so long, telling me that as a diabetic with an open fracture which had been bathed in ditch water I was virtually guaranteed to get an infection, and he’d have to give me prescriptions for a wide variety of exotic antibiotics.

I have subsequently been told that if you’re quiet and stoic, they’ll keep shuffling you to the end of the line and deny you any pain relief, the thinking being that you can’t be too badly off if you aren’t making a big scene, wailing, and carrying on. I mistakenly thought they were professionals making triage decisions on the basis of medical science and logic.

Awww. Yes, you can take a pillow. Take what you can to help you pass the time and be comfortable. As much as it’s horrible to have to wait to be seen, I always imagine what’s going on in the background that we can’t see.

I remember waiting to see a doctor at the hospital and the waiting room was full of cranky people. When I got to see the doctor, I wasn’t cranky, but I said something like “you must be busy tonight” and the doc told me they’d had a swag of heart attacks and a major road accident come in through the back doors. Pity they couldn’t come through the front so all the people whining out there could see why they were waiting. Not that you’re complaining @RedDeerGuy1. I just find it helpful to remember the staff may be dealing with a lot that we can’t see when we have to wait in a hospital.

Yes but caution: when you get home- wash the pillow, cover, blanket, whatever. You do not wish to know what they may bring home with them.

^^I agree about the washing. Wash your clothing too. Hospitals are very germy.

Sure…....bring it along with your disease. That’s what ERs are for.

@msh When I go home from a doctor’s office or hospital I take my shoes off and put them in a bag before I get in the car. If they are tennis shoes they get dumped into the washer when I get home. If they are not washable shoes I leave them outside the door upside down for a couple of days before bringing them in. Sometimes I wipe the bottoms with a disinfecting wipe. I met a woman who got a mrsa infection when she brought a box home that had been on a hospital floor. She had a scratch on her arm. She was expecting to lose her arm. I don’t know how it ended. Hospitals are germy places.

I can’t see why not really. Did someone say anything to you about it?

@RedDeerGuy1 , If you don’t mind telling us, what are your symptoms, and what does the hospital do to relieve them? I mean no offense, but it sounds a little odd to say, I woke up suffering from my mental illness and went to the hospital emergency room for relief.

As for the pillow, I can’t imagine what objection the hospital could possibly have.

@LostInParadise Anxiety, worry, confusion , time travel, regret and reliving horrible times in my life. The hospital gives me oatmeal and juice and offers me an Ativan tablet. I refuse the pill and eat the meal then take a cab home at 5 am.

The net result of your hospital visit was a bowl of oatmeal and a glass of juice. You could have provided these things for yourself. What were you expecting? Maybe what you needed was to be someplace safe surrounded by other people, in which case the 5 hour wait was helpful. I am sorry that you suffer so much and that your psychiatrist cannot provide more help.

@LostInParadise Well yes. I was afraid and needed supervision.

Mental health crises are real and can require an ER visit.

Anyone feeling they are having a mental crisis absolutely is justified to go to the ER. Most hospitals have an inpatient psych floor for a reason. Not that every mental health ER patient needs to go inpatient, but the ER is an appropriate place for someone who needs acute psych help. Blood tests are often in order, and sometimes medication. If there is a psych hospital in the area that would likely be better though.

Anything whose sole treatment is oatmeal and juice is hardly a mental crisis. The OP has apparently done this several times and is likely on a first name basis with hospital personnel. He can afford the hospital visits because Canada has socialized medicine. I am not criticizing him but, based on his past visits, it is easy to understand why he is given low priority. He should bring a pillow and blanket (maybe someone can tuck him in), spend the night, and get served breakfast.

@LostInParadise, you can’t make that judgement. If he feels lost and unhinged, he should reach out. If oatmeal and juice and the care and connection to hospital staff helps him feel safe and secure, who are we to say he wasn’t suffering a mental crisis? Perhaps he suffers from panic attacks. I’d much rather have a health care system that looks after people than one that leaves people to struggle on alone.

At the very least, you would have to agree that just being in the hospital is likely what helps, and that the low priority that his case receives is justified.

I feel sorry for the OP. He has said that he suffers from an unknown mental disorder, which includes time travel delusions, and is taking medicine for schizophrenia. He has had a history of being bullied and is very isolated, spending most of his time in his apartment. He is living on money from the government, and is resentful of the required visits to social workers. I do not see any likelihood of his life turning around. I hope I am wrong.

Nothing in his post is criticising how he is rated by hospital staff @LostInParadise. As to @RedDeerGuy1‘s mental health diagnosis, history and future, I’m not qualified to comment. I’ll leave that to his medical doctors who actually meet with him in person.

@MollyMcGuire – !!!! Oh that poor woman! Wow. That is the worst result I’ve heard. I hope all is well with her. I am so glad you said that about the clothes- I also dismantle the clothes, shoes, everything upon getting home. Immediate washloads! I once sat waiting for someone in the ER while they were being cared for inside. I saw everything from a horrible case of whooping cough from a two year old- playing with the provided toys and wandering around everyone, to someone who had food poisoning, a person yelling at one and all, a gunshot wound not serious enough to hurry- but very messy, a carving board accident cutting bagles, and someone who couldn’t stay sitting in a chair- you name it. By the time my friend was done and released, I was ready to be hosed down by HAZMAT workers. I guess I must’ve looked a little shellshocked, to his amusement. Then I found out it was a full moon. Bless the ER staff and crews!

@msh I forgot to mention Echinacea. Take two when you get home. :)

You are a Very Smart Woman! ;)

I guess this depends on the hospital that you are admitted to.