Virginia Mason Hospital

They were very generous in making sure I got a private room so my sister could stay with me. Negatives were that they didn't have large enough pressure stockings for my size (they only had up to XL and they said I needed 2XL) and the bathrooms in the rooms had handicap bars on both sides of the toilet that were so close together that it was impossible to sit fully on the toilet. I even asked my size 10 sister to try it out and see if it was just because of my size and she said it was very tight for her to sit on it.

The surgical dept and staff and surgeon and team were fantastic!!! It was all down hill after the surgery, however. I was in so much pain I couldn't quite crying and all they could say was that they had ordered the morphine pump and it hadn't come up to the floor yet. If it hadn't been for my best friend being there they would have left me to scream in pain. As it was it took her 20 minutes to explain to them that they needed to control my pain iv push until the iv pump showed up (which didn't happen for more than another hour. My pain tolerance is not good, as I have found out from other operations and I discussed this with my surgeon and asked to have it put in my records ahead of time. Some one goofed. I had a couple of other instances of uncontrolled pain too. Then they switched pain medication typed and overmedicated me. No one offered to help me clean up or shower until the day I was leaving (went home on day three). Nurses ignored call buttons on swing and graveyard. Nurses were very young and afraid to advocate for the patients. The hospital was dingy and the restroom out in the hall filthy. It was 87 degrees inside the hospital and I cooked the whole time I was there. It was actually cooler outside on the sidewalk. They wanted me to have a wheel chair to leave but that had been ordered for 35 minutes when I gave up and left. I will never use this hospital again. Too bad, because the surgeon, Dr. Jeffrey Hunter is excellent.

The staff was very young and caring just don't try to get anything at shift change because they are so busy. I felt that they didn't ignore me when I did ask for something. I did have a lot of nausea and they gave me medicine for that.

I had surgery on Tuesday and was released on Wednesday. My stay was wonderful.

The pre-op care was absolutely wonderful. I felt cared for and secure. It was the staff on the GI floor post operatively that sucked. They were absolutely horrible. My sister even witnessed them falifying my medical records. It took over 45 minutes for someone to respond to the nurse call button. There were people so fed up they were just yelling for nurses. I was glad to get out of there. I felt safer at home where I knew people would respond if I called and would tend to my needs. There was only one nurse (Asmaret) and one CNT (Britt) that I liked. Everyone else was a joke. Shame on VM for this kind of medical care and then charge $20k for it.

Virginia Mason Hospital is a great Hospital. My experiences have been, for the most part, very positive. My only negative comment, and it is a very major shortcoming, is that the nursing staff on the patient floors seemed very insufficient to support the patient load. My wife and I needed to get very insistant with the nursing leads about responding to the call buttons and my pain med needs more promptly.

The nurses are clearly overworked, especially the night RN's. They were all attentive and frequently assessed my pain level, keeping my pain to a minimal. The experience was pleasent and better than average. I would be a patient there again.

Most staff were wonderfully kind and caring. Anesthesia was fantastic and so supportive of WLS, it was fantastic going into surgery in their hands. The pre-op nurses were fantastic, again kind and caring and eased my nervousness.
The floor nurses were again kind but didn't see much of them though they did come in at least one time per shift. The PCT's did most of the care and they were nice but many were inexperienced. I had a transporter ram the stretcher she was taking me to xray in, into the wall. This was the day after surgery and she never even said sorry. Disappointing as a human let alone a care giver.
Overall, the floor staff seemed pretty inexperienced with the requirements of post op WLS and I was glad I was really well informed or would have done some things that I shouldn't have!

I had to rate the privacy of VMMC as excellent considering they never responsed to any calls and only entered my room to wake me up in the middle of the night by banging the blood pressure maching into my bed to wake me. The nurses were rude and nasty and after waiting 55 minutes for someone to respond to my call light I finally called the hospital operator and had her connect me with the nurses station and they still didnt come in!!! Not only was my IV empty and beeping, I couldnt sit up to get out of bed and get to the bathroom plus my mouth and throat were so dry I was choking and my glands were so swollen i couldnt swallow. I resorted to calling my husband who got up, showered and dressed and down to the hospital and they still hadnt come in to help me! He bitched them out but all that did was make them ignore me even more! I was born in this hospital and my Mom retired after 36 years of working there but I will NEVER go back there!

I think if you are looking for the best in surgeons you would be best to go to Virginia Masons. Every surgeon I met there was on top of their game. Kind, considerate and the best support. It was great.