High marks for Mercy Medical Center

As a publisher, we read with great interest the letters to the editor and note that there have been many in the past which have complained about the shortcomings of Mercy Medical Center. It seems many of these complaints originate from the emergency center, however, the letters negatively impact the whole institution.

Rarely do we personally get a chance to evaluate the Medical Center’s service on a first hand basis, however, last week this reporter did and found it exemplary.

Our doctor had requested that we have blood work up and a spinal tap as part of the on going diagnostic testing which followed six months of nonstop headaches.

During the Korean War, we were actually trained to be an advance medical corpmen in the military, so we were familiar with the procedure, and it used to be very scary.

We went to the Mercy Medical Center with fear of a painful ordeal and long waits, but this did not happen.

We were admitted immediately and didn’t even get to read a chapter of a book, before our primary paperwork was completed. It seems the doctor had not sent all the necessary information to the Medical Center so contact had to be made before continuing with the procedure. Fortunately the doctor was at her office and this was handled with ease.

We also did not have our insurance papers on file at Merced Medical Center. Our Medicare card had been lost years ago when sailboat flipped and our wallet ended up in the lake. No problem, there was a copy on file at the doctors office and it was faxed to the hospital.

Finally we were ready for the procedure to start and that was in a different part of the Mercy Medical Center, which as people know is huge. We were taken from the reception office to the part of the building where the spinal tap would be performed by a community volunteer, who we just by chance knew by name. He was very helpful and lead up right to the counter to check in.

He was one of a group of four or five volunteers at this office of the Medical Center. There must have been dozens of them located all over the hospital, giving hundreds of hours of volunteer time for this very worthy duty.

Within a half hour of our original arrival at the Medical Center we were in a dressing room being asked to put on a hospital gown. They are not very attractive things and strictly necessary to cover the parts of the body which needed to be covered.

In our case, we looked kind of exposed in the rear, as we walked down the hall. One of the nurses assistants, hurried with a second hospital gown to cover the rear, but we assured her that there was no embarrassment, we have been in the Army and nothing was sacred.

The tech persons waiting in the lab room were very direct and answered all our questions. One of the tech persons was instructing two others who were presently attending Merced College. She had also received her original training two years earlier at Merced College.

Now down to the procedure. We asked if it would be painful. She said we would be under a local anaesthetic, however, there were many nerves in the spinal column and if by chance one was hit there would be pain.

Every precaution would be taken to prevent this from happening with the use of an X-ray machine that shows the doctor exactly where the spinal opening is. We were fortunate and no nerves were hit. The doctor extracted four viles of fluid from our spine and within an hour, we were done and could go home after about a 20 minute rest.

All and all we give the whole team at Merced Medical Center top marks for a job well done. We feel fortunate to have such a facility in our community.