One year ago today ChristianaCare (CCHS), the mega-hospital that dominates Upper Delaware, sent me a letter to inform me that it was “terminating our relationship” and that I was being “discharged from all ChristianaCare outpatient practices.” The letter claims that my “actions towards ChristianaCare caregivers have consistently created a hostile environment for our care team that is not sustainable,” which is laughable, and a projection.
Out of the dozens of doctors I encountered over my 4 years in that system, I only had major issues with these:
- the “embedded psychologist” who ignored my complaints about the increasing suicidal ideations caused by the Lexapro prescribed by a resident physician and failed to keep his promise to find qualified care for my severe PTSD and thereby effectively fed me to the Cuckoo’s Nest called Rockford Center for Behavioral Health, and
- The surgeon who cut wedges of healthy tissue off my genitals without consent and has done it to other women so often and so many times the nurse called it “The Dr. G___ Special.” (If I spell out his name I could face legal consequences; that’s how well the law is set up to protect predators, perps, and incompetents in medicine.)
According to the letter, if I enter any CCHS campus for anything but emergency care, or contact any ChristianaCare representative or provider, the mega-hospital may file “harassment and/or criminal trespass charges,” which is hilarious, as its own “constables” (para-police) harassed me under the very clear definition in the Code of Delaware. Funny how the corporation can get away with harassing aggrieved patients, but the patient is the problem. Corporate America at its best. It ain’t about health and it ain’t about care.
Hello, Christiana Care:
Actually, your system was toxic for everyone–patients, providers, and administrators–decades before I showed up. It’s laughable that you try to pin it on me.
What you really mean is that I’m the one who talks about CCHS abuse of patients and won’t shut up. What offends you is that I refuse to stop talking about what that toxic culture did to me and too often does to the others who encounter it.
“Discharging” me from the system was the best thing CCHS ever did for me. In fact, turning to your institution for help with Complex PTSD is my biggest regret in the past 5 years.
I met abuse, neglect, and incompetence in your Emergency Department, where the physician wrote down absolute nonsense in my record, and your records department resorted to corporate skullduggery to avoid correcting the record.
I experienced even further abuse in your Psych Emergency Department, where I was neglected, traumatized, lied to, and manipulated into agreeing to Rockford for “a few days” because it would be “a gateway to services,” but it was a freaking Cuckoo’s Nest of abuse, rights violations, neglect, warehousing and drugging. I could only expect worse now that you’ve put the mark on my record.
These and other abuses caused me to develop serious Medical PTSD. I can’t have the 7″ of hernias in my 14″ belly repaired due to the terror of being “surprised” by a surgeon again.
In the year since my permanent discharge, I’ve discovered that much of my “Medical PTSD” was actually ChristianaCare PTSD. Visits and procedures in other facilities are not nearly as challenging. I actually feel quite safe at Delaware Outpatient Center for Surgery, where no provider 0r staffer has caused me harm. So, thanks, ChristianaCare Highly-toxic System, for setting me free. I wish everyone could know this level of relief from your cruelty and contempt.