These weren't the sights we were planning to see. We'd planned to spend a day at the Louvre. Maybe cruise up and down the Seine. Have lunch in the Eiffel Tower restaurant. Typical touristy things. But instead we've spent time looking at bags of saline solution, blood, glucose and iron. At one time they had Mark hooked up to four different bags of stuff at the same time. I'll admit it was worrisome. I just thought he was in a ward. I had no idea he was in intensive care. Had I known, I would have been terrified.
Meanwhile, I became somewhat familiar with the Hopital Lariboisiere. The picture doesn't do it justice. This time of year the gardens are in full bloom and the pots that line the roof of the building are all full of blooms, as well. The statuary was nice, too. All this just a 10-minute walk from our hotel. But we weren't there to admire the gardens and statuary. We were there for healthcare. Healthcare in France is somewhat different than in the US. For starters there isn't so much paper work to fill out. When we told them we had American Express Travelers Health Insurance - we only had to provide them with the policy number and allow them to make a copy of Mark's passport. End of paperwork until we were ready to check out. They assumed, rightly so, that Mark has a British National Health number. That allowed us to walk out without providing a credit card. If it hadn't been for that, the bill would have come to roughly 3800 euro. (No idea what that is in dollars, but I'm pretty sure that a few days in intensive care in a US hospital would have been ten times as much.)
As for treatment, Mark spent the first night in the ER. They ran tests, as they do in the US. Because he was in a private treatment room, I was allowed to stay with him. His vitals were monitored all night, and some tests were performed. After one night, we new a great deal about what it wasn't.
In the morning when he was stable, I was sent back to the hotel to get a few hours sleep and told I could come back in a few hours. But in the meantime they moved him to a what I thought was a ward, but was in fact intensive care. The day shift nurses were not especially nice. They were focused on "the rules" which say that no one can visit until 2 in the afternoon. Although when I started to cry they did give me a few minutes with him before banishing me to the family waiting room.
This wasn't a particularly nice place. Even though the night shift folks didn't necessarily follow the rules (maybe because the AmEx Medical Assistance folks had called and asked them to cut us a bit of slack), the place filled up as the evening wore on. We started the afternoon with two people in the beds - Mark and one other guy. By 2 AM the place was stuffed. Far too much screaming - we were convinced there must be a torture chamber nearby. And it wasn't as clean as I expect a hospital to be. So glad when he got moved to a room.
I made the mistake of thinking that ALL food in France is good quality, tasty food. I thought the only thing you had to watch out for was fish served with the head on. It is not. French hospital food is even worse than airline food. What comes to mind when someone says "chicken and pasta"? Nice chunks of white meat chicken, pasta, some creamy sauce, maybe some broccoli or peas. Imagine my disappointment when I opened the tray and found plain rotini, no sauce and a somewhat greasy chicken leg. No vegetables. None. Oh yeah, there's no butter, salt or pepper, either. But really, those night shift folks were so nice to offer it to me. I was afraid that if I left to get something to eat I wouldn't be able to get back in. (It was tough enough to get back in if you went to the bathroom.) I thought I was starving until I tasted it. Appetite just left. Although the cheese, the bread and the peach were nice.
Everyone, paramedics, nurses and doctors (not so much those day shifters) all went out of their way to communicate with us. This whole thing about the French treating people who don't speak French rudely was just not true. They were all friendly and helpful and I will be forever grateful to them for helping us. Mark's blood loss was severe. At least I think it was. All in all he had to have five transfusions. He now has so much French blood in him that I expect him to start speaking French any moment.
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